Recently in Woodland Hills Neighborhood Council Category

The Woodland HIlls Warner Center Neighborhood Council's community forum on Saturday, Oct. 18, will feature a "Panel of Visionaries" offering different perspectives and strategies for addressing current transportation issues in the west San Fernando Valley.

The forum will be held from 8:30 a.m.-noon at the AMC Promenade Theater, 21801 Oxnard St., Woodland Hills. It will include a complimentary breakfast.

The panel will include L.A. Councilmember Wendy Greuel, Assemblymember Mike Feuer, Allison Yoh of the Rand Corp and Donald Shoup of UCLA.

Greuel is a champion of the city's strategic transportation plan, a comprehensive citywide vision that requires an investment in long-term planning.

Feuer is leading the charge with Measure R, a proposed 0.5 percent sale tax for transportation funding, which would generate $40 billion for transportation improvements throughout L.A. County.

Yoh is a former board member of the Metro and a member of the Rand Corp. team responsible for the recently released report "Moving Los Angeles," which offers Angelenos short-term transportation solutions that can be implemented during the next five years.

Shoup is a professor of urban planning at UCLA and author of "The High Cost of Free Parking," which establishes parking as a key link between transportation and land use, with important consequences for the community, economy and environment.

From the Woodland Hills Warner Center Neighbood Council's Web site -

The Woodland Hills Warner Center Neighborhood Council held its "Panel of Visionaries" recently and challenged a full house crowd to partner in establishing a "Great Streets!" vision.

Joyce Pearson, chair of the Woodland Hills Warner Center Neighborhood Council, opened the session by defining "Great Streets!" as "streets that connect us, that get us where we need to go and that are destinations, places that bring us together and create a Great Community."

Paula Daniels, Public Works Commissioner, presented the city's Green Streets program and challenged the community to partner with the City in applying new technologies and skills to the opportunities that face us in improving the quality of life through street design.

Doug Failing, Director of Caltrans District 7, spoke enthusiastically of the Caltrans commitment to local issues and his commitment to addressing the whole system, not simply the streets. "Anything you do, do comprehensively. Nothing happens in a vacuum," he said.

Mott Smith, a self-proclaimed "greedy developer," offered examples from Pasadena to Eagle Rock to Atwater Village on how communities have worked with developers to bring in the "good" partners by addressing parking code, the planning process and the rules regarding parcels.

Taft High School in Woodland Hills is a bit more beautiful today, thanks to the efforts, in part, of the Woodland Hills Warner Center Neighborhood Council.

Outside the school - on the corner of Ventura Boulevard and Winnetka Avenue - there are now rose bushes, benches, new sidewalk surfacing, a mounted trash can and, best of all, an "Econo-Green Syngrass" to cover the former dirt patch that wouldn't hold grass previously because of significant foot traffic.

The project was spearheaded by Marion Lovelace, a community beautification activist in Woodland Hills, and Heath Kline, director of community services for the Woodland Hills Warner Center Neighborhood Council.

To read more about the project, visit www.whcouncil.org.

This is a busy month for Club Red Square in Woodland Hills as the L.A. Police Commission, the zoning administration and the Woodland Hills Warner Center Neighborhood Council all act to investigate and rule on the operations of the club and review the various permits and conditions that regulate Club Red Square, according to the neighborhood council's Web site.

The club is located at 20001 Ventura Blvd., Woodland Hills.

The Police Commission will discuss Club Red Square on Wednesday, July 9, at Parker Center.

The commission has authority over the club's dance permit and the club's ability to host special events and private parties. Community concerns include of inappropriate use of the patio, the criminal activities of the patrons on the surrounding streets and in the neighborhood, violations of their CUP regulating the sale of alcohol and other issues will be addressed and the Police Commission will determine if the Club Red Square is in compliance.

The Woodland Hills Warner Center Neighborhood Council will discuss the club on Wednesday, July 9, at the Warner Center Park Bredlow Band Shell.

The council's board will vote on a planning, land use & mobility committee motion requesting "that the proper city agencies revoke the CUP for Club Red Square or impose and implement corrective conditions equating to the revocation of the sale of alcohol on said premises."

The Office of Zoning Administration will discuss the club on Friday, July 18, at the Marvin Baude Center in Van Nuys.

The administration will also review the community's concerns and charges that the club is a public nuisance. This meeting is a follow-up to a prior meeting where the LAPD testified, Councilmember Dennis Zine's office presented information, the Neighborhood Council went on record and residents spoke of their experiences with the club.

All in all, this meeting is a significant opportunity for residents to speak in support of severe restrictions on the operation of the club, including limiting the hours, the elements of the club such as music, dancing, arcade games and the service of liquor (bar service or table service or self service) as well as ratio of alcohol-to-food sales. (50-50 to 30-70)

Other restrictions include happy hour bans, free food bans and price reduction bans.

The Club Red Square journey through the system has been long and slow with the prior Police Commission hearing postponed and the prior Zoning Administration hearing scheduled for the end of May pushed to mid-July.

Adding to the complicated process, Club Red Square recently filed for Chapter 11 protection.

For more information, contact Jonathon Brand of Councilmember Zine's office at jonathan.brand@lacity.org or at 818-756-8848.

The Woodland Hills Warner Center Neighborhood Council's next community forum will feature a "Panel of Visionaries" offering perspectives and philosophies on what makes a great street.

The forum will be held from 8-11:30 a.m. Saturday, Aug. 16, in the auditorium at Kaiser Permanente, 5601 De Soto Ave., Woodland Hills.

Sustainability, mobility, accessability, walkability, ridability, enjoyability and profitability are all benefits of having a great street in a mixed-used development, according to the forum organizers.

Rick Cole, who has been city manager of Ventura since 2004, will be on the panel.

Called "one of Southern California's most visionary planning thinkers" by the L.A. Times, Cole is widely cited as an urban policy expert.

He previously served six years as city of manager of Azusa. Under Cole's leadership, Azusa was described as the "most improved city in the San Gabriel Valley" by the San Gabriel Valley Tribune.

For more information about the upcoming community forum, visit www.whcouncil.org.

More than 300 people attended the Destiny of the West Valley community forum recently, showing a commitment to making Woodland Hills-Warner Center a great neighborhood, according to Stephen Box, of the Woodland Hills Warner Center Neighborhood Council, which sponsored the event.

The day began with the usual questions about 311 and potholes, Box stated, and L.A. County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky summed up the event by encouraging residents to take charge of their neighborhood.

The Daily News wrote a story about the forum. You can read it by clicking here.

The next community forum about the West Valley will be held on Aug. 16, Box stated.

A community forum called "Destiny of the West Valley" will be held from 8-11:30 a.m. Saturday, June 21, in the auditorium at Kaiser Permanente Medical Center, 5601 De Soto Ave. Woodland Hills.

The free, public meeting, sponsored by the Woodland Hills Warner Center Neighborhood Council, will feature a panel of officials who will cover important issues that face the West Valley including traffic congestion, urban design, water reclamation, energy conservation, mass transit, accessibility, mobility, walkability and livability.

"I know many of you are as concerned as I am about our community and its quality of life," said Joyce Pearson, chair of the neighborhood council. "And only you, as a community, can bring a force for the right kind of change on our neighborhoods."

Denny Zane, former mayor of Santa Monica who spearheaded the revitalization of the Third Street Promenade, will address the economics of a walkable community as well as the funding sources for an effective mass transit system.

Gloria Ohland, vice president of Reconnecting America and host of the recent StreetCar Conference in LA, will present transportation options that improve the quality of life in the community, have a positive economic impact for property owners and that relieve congestion and provide viable choices for commuters.

Larry E. Smith, executive director of North East Trees and innovator behind the Green Streets project, will demonstrate how a commitment to improving the quality of life by restoring nature's services will result in water-reclamation standards that will be the envy of the city.

For more information, call Stephen Box at 323-962-6540

In early April, the Los Angeles United School District offered to share campuses with nearly 40 charter schools. Taft High School in Woodland Hills was one of the proposed shared campuses, according to the Web site for the Woodland Hills-Warner Center Neighborhood Council.

Shortly thereafter, former LAUSD Superintendent Ray Cortines re-joined the school district, this time as the senior deputy superintendent.

Then, the Woodland Hills-Warner Center Neighborhood Council convened a town hall meeting at Taft and a standing-room-only audience let Cortines, LAUSD Boardmember Marlene Canter and a full panel of LAUSD officials know that the community was vehemently opposed to compromising the Taft High program by sharing the campus with a charter school, the neighborhood council's Web site states.

Recently, LAUSD announced that, in spite of the threat of litigation, the district is rescinding seven of the charter offers that were made, including the offer to CHAMPS Charter for classroom space at Taft High School.

Shortly after that, LAUSD announced that all responsibilties for day-to-day district operations have been shifted to Cortines.

At 6 p.m. tonight, there will be a special meeting of the Woodland Hills Neighborhood Council at Taft High School to address budget issues, including discussing Mayor Villaraigosa's proposed budget.

Part of the discussion will examine the changes in neighborhood council funding and policies regarding the retention and spending of council rollover funds from one fiscal year to the next.

Taft High is located at 5461 Winnetka Ave., Woodland Hills.

At 7 p.m., the council will hold a town hall meeting to address the LAUSD’s proposal to house CHAMPS Charter School on the Taft High School campus.

LAUSD board member Marlene Canter, LAUSD Senior Deputy Superintendent Ramon Cortines and teachers' union president A.J.Duffy are slated to participate in the meeting.

At the March meeting of the Woodland Hills Neighborhood Council, board member Sean McCarthy spoke out against the number "grass-roots" advertising signs cropping up in the community, selling everything from handyman services to paternity testing to copper repiping.

He brought in several signs to the meeting, signs he personally had taken down, according to the council's Web site, www.whcouncil.org.

"How do we expect kids to respect the law and our community when they are surrounded by illegal and ugly signs that clutter our streets?" he asked. "It sends a message that our public space is also a bulletin board! It's no wonder then that we end up with graffiti."

Residents spoke in support of McCarthy's battle to clean up what is basically manufactured graffiti and cited other examples such as the "New Homes" signs that litter the landscape.

Residents said they are frustrated trying to stop this underground advertising and are having difficulty getting support from officials who are responsible for dealing with muncipal code violations.