Thursday, August 19, 2010

Move Lloyd Wright House To Abalone Cove? Some Think It Would Solve Two Problems At Once


The folks at city hall are kicking around an idea that at least some of them think might kill two birds with one stone, combining "public usefulness with historic significance" in the words of RPV Senior Administrative Analyst Sara Singer.

Basically, the idea is to move the Lloyd Wright house at 504 Paseo Del Mar, (at left), which the present owner wants to tear down but some local preservationists want to keep, to Abalone Cove, where the city has applied for a $5,500,000 state grant to build a Nature Education Center in the parking lot.

"Age, construction material and split-level design would present some challenges for moving," according to Singer. Additionally, she said in an email, "The transition from private home to public space brings significant accessibility, seismic and other building code issues."

She noted that this concept had not been included in the original grant application. But, she said, if the city is awarded this grant, the staff will present this concept to the City Council. If the city does not get the grant, "there is no other funding currently budgeted for these improvements," Singer said, adding that,   "If the City Council directs staff to continue exploring this option and allocates funding for it, then we would continue looking into the viability of this project. "

Asked about the timing of the entire project, Singer said, "The grant awards will be announced in December, and if the grant were awarded we would go through the entitlement process and the public would be invited to participate.  Please note that in the grant application the architectural design of the proposed building was to be influenced by the architectural style of Wayfarer’s Chapel."
The Chapel, a local landmark designed by Lloyd Wright, is across Palos Verdes Drive South from the proposed Abalone Cove project.

"I think it’s good for public and non-profit groups to be aware of these significant buildings that are threatened for destruction in case the right opportunity arises to preserve them in a community where authentic architectural significance is rare" Singer said.

For much more background on the proposed Nature Education Center at Abalone Cove,  please check this earlier post on my blog.

If you have any thoughts about this concept that you want to share with our City Council, their email addresses and telephone numbers are here.
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Monday, August 16, 2010

Someone Thinks We're Nice

Talking about his experience setting up today's day of filming part of a commercial at a Portuguese Bend home, Location Manager Dave Fertig commented on how friendly and cooperative everyone has been during the process. "I'll recommend this area again," he said.

It's always nice to get a good review. We hope he feels the same by the end of the day.
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Tuesday, August 10, 2010

New Show Opens Saturday at Zask Gallery

Zask Gallery invites everyone to its opening reception Saturday, August 14 from 6 to 9 p.m. for its new show, A Fine Line,  in which the common element among the artists is Line.

Sculptural works by Nick Agid and Michael Freitas Wood play with optical illusions using color, layering and light.
Hyunsook Cho shows the idiosyncrasies of language in a line of Korean/English text and explores her responses to her trip to China.

John Kantu's paintings express his deep obsession with Japanese culture, and then he lightens things up with some very small canvases with humorous images and text.

Heide Ulbrich's ceramic sculpture is based on combining impressions of architecture from her world travels.

The ps Zask Gallery, which is dedicated to showing contemporary fine art of established and emerging LA, national and international artists, is located at 31252 Palos Verdes Drive West, on the street level of the Golden Cove Shopping Center. The gallery is open Thursday through Sunday from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Portuguese Bend neighbors and artists Peggy and Ben Zask invite everyone to stop in and have a look around.

Monday, August 9, 2010

Portuguese Bend Artists Pitch In To Save Our Shoreline

The Portuguese Bend Artist Colony, which has already lent its financial and artistic support to the  Peninsula Land Conservancy, is continuing its support for preservation of the area by backing efforts to Save Our Shoreline. 

To that end, they are selling a limited edition of 20 giclee prints of Rick Humphrey's "Above the Cove on a Spring Day," for $100 each. (See image to the left.) Early shoppers have snapped up the first 15. Five are left. Anyone interested in purchasing one of these 16 by 20 inch prints should contact pinkhamd@aol.com.

Money raised from the sale of the prints will fund two half page ads in the Peninsula News on August 12 and 26. The ads will detail the campaign to oppose the city's plan to construct a 6,000 square foot building  designed to house educational exhibits, classrooms, a Ranger station and other things at Abalone Cove.

The city of Rancho Palos Verdes has applied for a $7 million dollar grant to carry out this project. The growing number of people who are opposed to it believe that the city already has a plan for improving the trails and general appearance of the area, and that the educational aspects of the plan could be carried out with bulletin boards and outdoor display cases. They are opposed to construction of a building on the last undeveloped coastal bluff top in the city and believe and that the so-called Nature Education Center should be constructed elsewhere, possibly neart the Interpretive Center, which already houses educational exhibits.

A more detailed account of this issue can be found in my blog here and here.

Other background on the issue is located on the RPV website here.

A petition opposing the development is here.  To contact Save Our Shoreline, email SaveOurShoreline2@gmail.com








Sunday, August 8, 2010

Board Seeks Replacement Member; Dialogue on Revised CC&Rs Continues

Board Member Tim Kelly opened the July board meeting by announcing that Casey Porter has resigned as Board President. No reason was given. Kelly said that the board will discuss a replacement board member next month, but in the meantime he suggested that anyone interested in filling the position should email a half page of information explaining why he or she would like to be on the board to tkellyrpv@aol.com.

Mike Cooper said that patching of cracks in the roads will continue and when completed, all roads will be slurried. 

This is a high fire season in our high fire area and board members indicated that lot owners are responsible for clearing weeds on their lots. Ditto for home owners.

Tim Kelly indicated that damage to the Narcissa gate would be repaired Tuesday or Wednesday.

The major portion of the meeting was given over to the latest revision of the CC&Rs. Board Attorney Kelly Richardson was on hand to answer questions. He explained that revision of the PBCA CC&Rs was particularly difficult because he was working from multiple sets of very old documents; additiionally, we have a unique situation here because many homes in the community are moving from their original (and legal) location. He said this situation is unique; he is not aware of any other homeowner association in the country with the same issues. 

He also said that in the work he has done so far, he is trying to look ahead to the future and anticipate problems and write a document that will make it unnecessary for residents to go to court to solve problems.

Asked why there was no mention of requirements for board members in the CC&Rs, ( an issue that was raised after Casey Porter moved out of the area but wanted to remain on the board), Richardson said that that subject is covered in the revised By-Laws, which he hopes the board will deal with soon. 

Specific sections of the revised CC&Rs that came up for discussion were:

Section 2.06 which Richardson described as an easement on all lots which would be recorded legally. He agreed to remove sections (i) and (ii) under Section 2.06.

Section 2.10: If the six owners of annexable lots agree to annexation, this section will be removed.

Questions were raised regarding Section 3.04 (b) (suspension of voting rights), but Richardson did not indicate he would make a change.

Objections were raised regarding Section 6.02, (number of legal occupants of a home), but Richardson said this is standard language for such documents. 

Section 6.04 will be changed to make all livestock exempt.

Section 6.14 will be reworded from "View Protection" to "Height Limitation."

If you do not have, or are unable to find, your current copy of the CC&Rs, to which this refers, email tkellyrpv@aol.com and ask for a duplicate copy.

Richardson will revise the current CC&Rs in line with comments received at the meeting and residents should receive a copy of that revision by email prior to the next board meeting September 6. Richardson hopes to set a voting date for approval of the final version soon. 

All the above information is fact.  Now comes the opinion.

1. It is my personal feeling that it would be nice if people who want to serve on the board could demonstrate some special skill that might be useful to the entire community.

2. It is hard for me to understand why so few people are interested in the revision of our CC&Rs. This is rather like a chance to vote on a revision of the Constitution of the United States. These are the rules that govern  our community and will govern it well after our children and their children inherit our homes and sell them, or we move away. These are major, long term changes to the rules that govern our community and it looks as if fewer than 35 people care. I know everyone is busy, but PLEASE, be concerned neighbors. I hate to see us be like the city of Bell. (If you didn't read that blog topic, it's here.)

Read the CC&Rs. Check the revisions. Talk to your neighbors. Come to the meetings where this is being discussed. This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

Last: I ran across this column by an attorney, regarding conflicts between Homeowners Associations and Green building laws. Has anyone thought about incorporating any Green Building regulations into any of our official documents? This attorney's column involves CC&Rs. We are also talking about changes to our Architectural Standards. But no one in Portuguese Bend has mentioned the word "Green" anywhere. Just a thought.

Monday, August 2, 2010

It's Come To Meetin' Night In Portuguese Bend

Gather up your new and old versions of the CC&Rs and bring all your paper work to the Monday, August 2, 2010, PBCA  Board Meeting at Ladera Linda.

Tim Kelly says the Board attorney will be there to answer questions about the CC&Rs. At least one resident thinks the board should explain  why we need the changes to the CC&Rs. I hope he shows up at the meeting and asks his question. It's basic and it never has been answered. An exercise in education might clear the air for a lot of us.

That is all that is on the agenda, but a few other questions may arise at the meeting.

Some residents received a mailing from the board outlining the procedure for collection of assessments, along with suggested amendments to the Architectural Standards. It appears that not everyone got the letter...but if you did, it may not be clear WHY you received it, because there was no accompanying explanatory information. I'm not sure, and my query on the subject has gone unanswered, but this MAY be the reason for the mailing: In order to amend the architectural standards, the proposed changes must be discussed at three board meetings and then the final version must be mailed to residents for final input. Tim Vaughan is in charge of this, so if you have any questions or comments you can call him at 310 265 2599 or email tim.vaughan@cox.net  It's possible that there will be discussion or a vote on these items Monday,  although it is not on the agenda.

Another possible topic of discussion is the entire fuss about the proposed change in air space designation for Long Beach airport and its impact on our coastline. If you're not familiar with this  issue, please read two earlier blog posts on it here and here.  The city is preparing to discuss this issue at the September 7 meeting, and  Terranea and Trump National Golf Club report that they "are dealing with it, " as are numerous citizens. My repeated inquiries to Board members about what, if any, plans they have to address this issue have gone unanswered. But perhaps it will come up at Monday's meeting.

By the way, the city has obtained a delayed date for input on this issue until September 21. However, do not write to the FAA to voice your opinion. The FAA has agreed to hear from the city of Rancho Palos Verdes. So, if you want to be heard, you can speak at the September 7  City Council meeting, and/or email  the council here.

You can read the city's information on this issue and sign up to receive updates on their listserv here 

The Architectural Committee meets at 7 p.m. Monday at Ladera Linda and the Board Meeting begins immediately afterward. PLEASE BE THERE. Your opinion counts and so does your vote.