CALABASAS : Builder Threatens to Sue Over Project Size

The developer of a proposed large-scale office and retail center in Calabasas is threatening to sue the city over a disagreement about the size of the project, an official for the development company said Thursday.

Talks between the city and Kilroy Industries to reduce the size of the project have broken down, said Mark Ossola, the company’s vice president.

“The negotiations have stalled, and unfortunately, litigation is probable,” Ossola said. “We’re hoping to work out a compromise, but that’s unlikely.”

The company has offered to reduce the project’s size and allow the community to help draw up a master plan for it, Ossola said. In exchange, the company wants approval to build a 200,000-square-foot retail center, in addition to the larger project.

The developer has received approval for a 1.5-million-square-foot office and retail center, known as Calabasas Park Centre, at the corner of Calabasas Road and Parkway Calabasas. The project includes a 50,000-square-foot retail center, which would serve the employees of the office center.

The developer now wants to increase the retail center to 200,000 square feet, but this cannot be done without the city’s approval.

“The community has a choice: Would you like us to build a 1.5-million-square-foot project right now,” Ossola said, “or a 200,000-square-foot retail center, with a smaller version of the 1.5-million (plan).”

The company, he said, would be willing to reduce the project’s overall size to 1.2 million square feet.

Councilman Marvin Lopata, a member of a city committee working with the developer to reach a compromise, suggested that Ossola may have overreacted, because Kilroy Industries’ proposal to reduce the project’s size in exchange for a larger retail center has yet to go to the City Council for a vote.

Lopata’s committee was formed after a City Council meeting in August at which all five council members told the developer they would reject the project unless it was scaled down.

Ossola declined to say by how much his company has offered to reduce the size of the project.

After Kilroy Industries made its most recent offer, Lopata said, the company’s officials “went to individual council members, and the consensus is they cannot get three votes and I think that’s where they are coming from.”

“I’m very sorry that that’s where it’s at, because in a lawsuit, I don’t think anybody wins,” Lopata added. “It’s very expensive and there’s always hard feelings.”

Ossola also said the two sides have failed to reach an agreement on the number of seats for a proposed movie theater that is part of the project.