Broad Beach Appoints Their Lawyer As Tax Collector, Tells Malibu West Its Beachhouse Will Be Auctioned Off

The battle between two neighborhoods in western Malibu is about to get even more ugly.

The Board Beach sand district plans to seize and auction off the beachfront Malibu West Swim Club beach house to the highest bidder … next November 12th.

The Broad Beach Geologic Hazard Assessment District claims that the Malibu West Swimming Club owes them 496,462 dollars and 33 cents in back taxes and penalties for the beach sand replenishment project.

That’s six years of unpaid taxes … imposed by a sand district that has yet to secure final government permits … and has yet to move one grain of sand.

Malibu West says two courts have already held that the Broad Beach tax assessment is illegal … because the beach club will not benefit from a project that will add sand up the beach from them … but not in front of them.

And … Malibu West is an association .. which as an association does not pay taxes.

Both a trial court and the state Court of Appeal have agreed with Malibu West … and ruled that the county cannot collect the assessment against the clubhouse.

But a tax lawyer for Broad Beach claims to have found a loophole. 

At a Broad Beach meeting last year … tax lawyer Michael Collins said that if the county won’t force Broad Beach to pay … the sand district can do it itself.

70514 TAX ACCOUNTANT 

“The county is not obliged to enforce the GHAD assessment, and as to properties that are not on the tax roll, they may not wish to do so. 

“So if the county officials are not to handle this sale, our remedy for a taxpayer who has not paid the assessment is to initiate the sale ourselves.”

And that is exactly what the Board Beach Geologic Hazard Abatement District is going to attempt to do … auction off the beachfront clubhouse … next November 12th. 

But Malibu West saw this coming a year ago.

Board member Pamela Aileron told the Broad Beach people last August that they have already lost twice in court … and trying to make an end run around the Appellate Court ruling by trying to go into the tax collection business on its own won’t work.

70512 MAKING IT UP PAMELA EILERSON

“What I am hearing is that you are sort of making it up on the fly… on dubious legality … to permanently alter the way that Malibu West is assessed, with the goal of forcing the sale of the Malibu West Beach club, to collect an assessment that has been determined by both a trial and an appellate court to be unconstitutional and unenforceable.”

Bad blood between the two neighborhood legal groups has been brewing for years.

Some Broad Beach residents resent the way Malibu West rents out their clubhouse … for weddings,

Broad Beach district member Shaul Kuba in August of last year.

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“We are getting all the noise the parking issues everything that comes with operating that facility, we are dealing with that.

“So I don’t think we are getting any benefit out of operating that club there.”

The special Broad Beach tax district was created back in 2011 … by a Malibu City Council that wanted nothing to do with beach sand issues.

The 128 Broad Beach landowners were given tax powers … and self control … and since then have grown into an agency that is collecting between 33 thousand dollars and 100 thousand dollars per year from each homeowner.

The district has already spent more than 25 million dollars in Broad Beach tax money on engineering studies and lawyers. 

The ultimate project needs more one hundred million dollars. … by some estimates. 

And they are going after Malibu West … despite a worry voiced by Broad Beach board member Shaul Kuba 13 months ago. 

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“I mean, you know that the news media would love that headline, us fighting with them, and someone’s picture would be in the newspaper. 

“I think they should pay … I mean … they’re the ones who are running a actual business, they are the only people running an actual business on the beach.”

The tax auction for the Malibu West clubhouse … November 12th at high noon … 

The signature on the order … “Kenneth Ehrlich, tax collector.”

Ehrlich is the lawyer for the Broad Beach tax district.

No comment this weekend from either side. 

Enormous Candelabra May Get Shortened By 16 Feet And Camouflaged, But County Wants It Out Front

The giant red antenna tower at the Malibu Civic Center … quite possibly the ugliest structure in the city … goes before the Malibu City Council next Monday.

LA County and the sheriff’s office insist that the communications tower is necessary to give deputies better coverage in Malibu’s canyons.

The county is willing to chop off the top 16 feet of the antennas … bringing the structure down to 75 feet as approved by the Planning Commission in 2016. 

The gangway at the top will be removed. 

And the county has convinced the FAA that the 75 foot tower does not have to be painted in aviation red and white stripes. 

The county will re-paint the monstrosity to a color selected by City of Malibu.

But opponents say that’s not enough.

The Malibu Township Council says the tower will effect electromagnetic emissions all across the region. 

That’s not true … the radio signals will be well within FCC safety levels. 

The Malibu Township Council says there needed to be testimony of a Public Health Expert Testimony. 

The city’s electronics experts testify that the signals war within FCC regulations,.. and therefore safe. 

The township council has used an electromagnetic analyzer to supposedly prove that other cellphone antennas in the area are drenching the zone with aerial pollution. 

That radio wave detection device was a cheap … broadband device that is not calibrated … not tuned and that may well be picking up TV set wall warts or Tesla cars.

But many of the radio signal claims made by the county are also dubious … and break down in analysis. 

For example .. the county says that it cannot move the tower because it could not get new license channels for point to point microwave lines. 

That ignores the simple possibility of modifying the existing channel to account for a slight change in location. 

And the coverage area for sheriff’s department two-way radios will not be substantially different from the repeater sites are moved within the county property … say .. to the back of the lot .. instead of right out in front. 

All this lands in the lap of the city council … next Monday night. 

Caltrans To Start Talks About Traffic Circles At El Matador And Encinal Canyon Road

Caltrans will take its proposal to install traffic slowing roundabouts in western Malibu to the city Public Works Commission on Wednesday night. 

The plan is to slow down PCH traffic at El Matador Beach … and at Encinal Canyon Road. 

Two PCH lanes in each direction would narrow to one … and traffic would have to negotiate the circles … a proven speed reduction tool.

The speed limit at those intersections is 55 miles an hour … but average traffic speeds are well above that  … as the road is straight and there is little cross traffic.

Except on beach days.

Just last week … a motorcyclist got med-evaced out with serious injuries after a car made a U-turn in from of them at El Matador beach.

It can be reasonably expected that the project will be hotly opposed by some people ij Malibu.

Comments have already been heard that the roundabouts will delay emergency evacuations … and fire trucks. 

Like other Caltrans traffic projects … this one grows out of the deaths of four Pepperdine students in a crash in eastern Malibu.

Many residents demanded traffic calming … like speed limit reductions and roundabouts.

Caltrnas responded with a pilot project … two roundabouts iin western Malibu.

The city says this project will be presented to the public Works Commission … but they apparently only will get an advisory vote.

Te project will also be presented to neighbors … for their opinions. 

But it will be up to the Malibu Planning Commission to make a decision on whether to grant the coastal development permit that the roundabout need.

That puts the roundabouts in legal question … as it’s not clear if the state would appeal to the city council if the planning commission votes no.

After all … it was Malibu that demanded traffic calming measures after the deaths of the four women. 

Now … the Planning Commission has the power to counteract what the majority of Malibu people plainly asked for last year.

The Planning Commission is about to get a Caltrans application for bike lanes and streetlights in western Malibu as well.

Port Of LA Proposed Jacking Up Bridge 36 Feet To Allow Taller Cargo Ships

Even bigger cargo ships might be sailing past Malibu … if the port of Los Angeles succeeds in an audacious plan to jack up the towers of the big green bridge in San Pedro.

The proposal … from the Port of Los Angeles … is to make the deck of the Vincent Thomas bridge 36 feet higher above the channel … to literally cut the support legs … jack them up like an elevator … and splice in new supports.

Entirely new freeways would have to be constructed at the connection to the 110 freeway in San Pedro … and over on Terminal island. 

If it sounds crazy … it’s been done once before … with the Bayonne Bridge in New Jersey.

The bridge would have to be closed for two years … diverting heavy truck traffic onto the 405 and surrounding streets.

The Port of LA says it already has investors lined up to pay for it. 

The new bridge would let container ships up to 211 feet high enter the inner harbor. 

The new Long Beach bridge is 205 feet of clearance.  

The current Vincent Thomas bridge deck is 185 feet of clearance.

Caltrans will make the yes or no decision. 

Small Texas Oil Player Faces Criminal Charges For Damaging Coastal Wetlands Without CA Permits

A Texas oil company trying to restart some leaky offshore oil drilling platforms 75 miles up the coast from Malibu now faces criminal charges.

The Santa Barbara County district attorney alleges that Sable Offshore blatantly ignored California environmental laws .. filled in creeks with dirt … and fouled coastal wetlands.

Sable Offshore already faces the largest fine ever issued by the California Coastal Commission … 18 million dollars … for intentionally violating state laws.

Sable bought three played-out offshore platforms near UC Santa Barbara from Exxon Mobil … and the small player is trying to squeeze more oil out and ship it to Bakersfield thru a pipeline that blew out in a major oil spill in 2015.

The president of Sable Offshore was a president of the oil pipeline company responsible for the spill 10 years ago … the biggest coastal oil disaster in the Malibu region since the massive 1967 spill.

Sable Offshore has not taken out any state permits to repair the pipeline and put three obsolete oil platforms back into service.

The company has also seen its stock price collapse … down 38 percent … as charges of insider trading are being leveled by outside lawyers.

Yesterday … the Santa Barbara County prosecutor charged Sable Offshore Corporation with five felonies and 16 misdemeanors.

The company issued a statement … “politically motivated” … “extremely misleading.”