City may demolish 12 homes

Barbara Diamond

The city has offered to pick up the costs to tear down Bluebird

Canyon homes that must be demolished and removed due to irreparable

damage caused by the June 1 landslide.

Affected homeowners must consent to the demolition, and will be

asked to agree to turn over to the city their insurance demolition

benefits, if any.

“I am trying to work up a quickie agreement that gives the city

the consent of the homeowners to demolish the homes and let us do so

in a way that would allow the homeowners to recover property,” city

slide coordinator Bob Burnham said. “It takes more time and more care

if personal belongings are recovered and adds substantially to the

costs.

“We would ask the property owners to assign the city the

demolition costs if they are covered by insurance.”

If the homeowner is not covered, Burnham said the city will

finance the demolitions, which helps all of the affected homeowners.

“We can’t winterize the slope and protect any property until the

structures are demolished,” Burnham said.

Twelve homes are, or have to be, demolished and removed, according

to Burnham. The number could change, but Burnham said 12 is pretty

solid.

“At this point, the city would finance it,” Burnham said. “No one

else is on the horizon.” City officials announced the proposal Monday

night at a meeting of affected homeowners, held at the Neighborhood

Congregational Church.

Burnham, Mayor Elizabeth Pearson-Schneider, city consulting

geologist Hannes Richter, city analyst Jamie Pendleton and Laguna

Relief and Resource Coalition representatives Ed Sauls and Marsha

Bode attended the meeting to update the displaced families on

activities in their behalf. The families are determined to be part of

the solution. A steering committee has been organized to help

families get their homes rebuilt as expediently as possible and to

provide interim support, including information.

“We are your neighbors and we are all in the same boat,” steering

committee president Stephen Huberty said.

“We are not a charity. We decided that is not what we want to do.

The resource center does that and does it better than we could. We

are not a homeowners’ association. We are not going to decide what

color your mailbox should be. We are a conduit to share information,

to share needs and help the city distribute information.”

Goals have been established for five sub-committees: external

communications, internal communications, rebuilding, government

relations and finance.

External communications chair Marcus Noble will deal specifically

with the media -- keeping the story alive.

Noble warned the homeowners that the slide is already “old news.”

“The landslide story is winding down,” Noble said. “The rebuilding

story is just beginning. We have to work to keep it current.”

Internal communications is a means to keep group members in touch

with one another.

“Our primary goal is to get contact information for all of you and

your neighbors so you can join our Yahoo group,” Huberty said.

The idea is to put the family that might need hard hats to recover

personal belongings or packing boxes together with a company or

individual that has them.

Kaveh Lahijani -- who owns two red-tagged properties, one that was

in construction and one that he was remodeling -- is heading up the

rebuilding sub-committee.

“I volunteered for this because we all have something in common,”

Lahijani said. “We need solutions that benefit more than one person.

“We have red-tagged homes in two categories -- some that are

completely destroyed and some that may be salvaged. We want to come

up with a solution that will get the salvageable homes stabilized

before the winter.”

The committee’s second phase will be as a conduit for neighborhood

improvements, such as undergrounding utilities and the creation of a

secondary egress from the canyon to make evacuation more efficient in

times of disaster.

The last phase would be the rebuilding of the homes -- which could

be expedited by fast-tracking the design review process or

eliminating it for homes that will be replaced in kind, as was done

after the 1993 firestorm. City fees also were waved and construction

hours were extended, making it cheaper and faster to rebuild.

“If we move forward together, we will get there faster,” Lahijani

said.

Todd McCallum will head up the government relations sub-committee,

mentored by Dale Ghere, who was instrumental in pushing through

reconstruction after the 1978 Bluebird Canyon landslide.

MaCallum outlined five key roles for the subcommittee: act as a

go-between with the local government, ensure other subcommittees get

to the right people in government to get their jobs done, keep the

families informed, and update the city on the groups’ activities by

attending government meetings.

Representatives of In Case of Emergency offered free

record-keeping books to document belongings and other pertinent

information to the families. The books are available at the Resource

Center, 3305 Laguna Canyon Road, behind Kubisek’s Antiques.

Sauls announced at the meeting that the resource center would be

distributing $500 this week to each family that expects to be out for

at least a year.

The steering committee will meet again on Monday at the

Neighborhood Congregational Church, 340 St. Ann’s Drive on the corner

of Glenneyre Street.