Verizon Communications returned a second time to seek approval of the Chatsworth Neighborhood Council Land Use Committee to place antennas on the roof of a storage-unit building on Topanga Canyon Boulevard.
Tanya Roth and Argineh Mailian won unanimous approval Thursday after showing architectural drawings of a pair of rooftop cupolas that will be integrated into the design of the building at to mask the communications equipment.
Committee members also discussed, at length, the new sports fields at De Soto Avenue and Rinaldi Street just below the Ronald Reagan Freeway.
The 12-acre property includes a field for football, soccer and lacrosse and another for baseball.
The primary concerns were placement of the city-mandated 90 parking spaces at the ball fields and the safety of pedestrians crossing De Soto after parking on the street or in the nearby high school garage on Rinaldi Street. The committee questioned whether there is actually space for that parking now that the ball fields are built.
They also discussed equestrian trails that could be impacted by the project and questioned whether school buses would have enough room to turn around in the approved 90-stall parking lot off De Soto Avenue.
Sierra Canyon officials are scheduled to attend the next Chatsworth Neighborhood Council Equestrian Committee meeting on Nov. 9 to discuss the equestrian issues.
The committee also was told that the gymnasium under construction on the high school Rinaldi Street campus complies with the approved height restriction, according to a city building inspector.
Also on the evening’s agenda was an update on a request by the at 20901 Devonshire St. for a zoning variance to sell beer and wine for off-site consumption, plus an update on the proposed 188-home Hidden Creeks Estates and Preserve development north of the Ronald Regan Freeway in unincorporated county territory.
Committee Chair Linda van der Valk reported that at a city hearing earlier this month no decision was made on granting the variance to Walgreens after complaints were made about loiterers outside the building and unkempt landscaping.
Van der Valk said the retailer did, however, admit to being “soft on solicitors,” and that Walgreens would take a harder stance.
“My concern is that things will be fine and dandy for a while and then (things) will go back to the way they were,” van der Valk said.
She also said that in the past the store had to stop tobacco sales for a month after being cited for selling cigarettes to minors.
Chatsworth resident, Jeannie Plumb, reported on a Boundary Adjustment Board hearing she attended recently on Hidden Creeks Estates, a proposed gated community between Browns and Mormon creeks.
Plans include 25 equestrian properties, public recreation facilities outside the north gate on an extension of Mason Avenue through Porter Ranch, and more than 100 acres of open space, most of which is not buildable.
Plumb said the developer was ordered to return with two financial impact reports, one on how the project, if annexed, would benefit the city and the other on how the city would benefit by annexing the property without the development.
The Land Use Committee voted in September to reject the project. County zoning would allow only 33 ranchettes. If annexed, the city would allow higher density, and give the developer access to city utilities.
During the September meeting, Paul Edelman, deputy director of the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy, spoke vehemently against the development on what he called 285 acres of “premier wilderness.”
At its October board meeting, the Chatsworth Neighborhood Council ratified the committee motion to reject the project.
