San Vicente Boulevard in Brentwood’s business district is lined with London plane and coral trees ‘ not huge billboards and tall advertising signs. Brentwood Community Council Chair Wendy-Sue Rosen, however, is concerned that the scenic corridor could be turned into an advertising smorgasbord as a result of a 2001 agreement between the City of Los Angeles and CBS/Decaux. The agreement requires that 3,350 bus shelters, newsstands, public toilets, kiosks and benches displaying advertising be installed citywide in the next 20 years. The majority of that furniture will be placed in District 11, which includes Brentwood and Pacific Palisades, based on a belief that the district will generate more advertising revenue than other areas. The city receives a guaranteed share of the total profit from the advertising revenue (about $150 million over the life of the agreement) and is using the money for beautification projects. When Rosen drove around her community with a CBS/Decaux representative trying to find locations for the street furniture, the representative kept asking for sites on San Vicente. ‘It became very clear to us what their intent was,’ Rosen said, so the Brentwood Community Council sought legal advice, pooling its money together with neighborhood associations in Century City and Westwood to hire attorney Beverly Grossman Palmer of Strumwasser & Woocher to conduct research. Palmer found that the contract between the City of Los Angeles and CBS/Decaux violates the city’s General Plan, which protects scenic highways (such as Sunset Boulevard) and scenic corridors (San Vicente) from advertising signs. The contract also violates the Brentwood and Pacific Palisades Specific Plans, which have signage restrictions. At last Thursday’s Pacific Palisades Community Council meeting, Rosen asked the Council to join her to ‘fight blight,’ as she calls it. ‘Once you put advertising in an area, it starts a precedent for that area,’ Rosen told the Council, which has historically opposed street furniture in the Palisades. In the coming months, representatives from the Brentwood council and neighborhood associations will be meeting with Palmer to discuss strategies for how to legally battle street furniture in protected areas. Rosen invited the Council to send a representative to those meetings and to contribute financially toward legal fees. ‘The research benefits all of us financially because we are sharing the cost,’ Rosen said. The Brentwood council has raised $10,000 from the homeowners associations and its business district to help pay for any future litigation, but more is needed. Last Thursday, Council Vice Chair Richard G. Cohen informed Rosen that the Council would vote on whether to join the Brentwood council’s efforts at its July 10 meeting. ‘I hope to be telling you soon that we will be joining you,’ Cohen said. In the meantime, he created a subcommittee to work with Councilman Bill Rosendahl’s office to locate two new sites for public-amenity kiosks and possibly an alternative location for the proposed bus shelter for the corner of Via de la Paz and Sunset. The bus shelter is scheduled to be installed this summer. The public-amenity kiosks are freestanding three-sided or two-sided structures, which have one or two advertising panels and a panel for a local vicinity map, community poster or public-service announcement. At the June 12 meeting, Rosendahl’s field deputy Jennifer Rivera asked the Council to approve two locations, one on Sunset and Castellammare and the other on Sunset and Pacific Coast Highway, for public-amenity kiosks or suggest other sites. The goal of the subcommittee, chaired by Council member Susan Nash, will be to keep the furniture out of areas protected by the Specific Plan, such as the Village. ‘Hopefully, we can get the city to agree in writing that if we give them these three, we will be done,’ Cohen said. ‘I’m afraid it will be ongoing.’
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