The LA Weekly follows up on its previous expose on Building & Safety chief Andrew Adelman, after Laura Chick released her scathing audit of the department. We love her scathing audits of City departments. So much waste, so little time, heh?
Apparently, cronyism and unchecked inspectors have turned the department into little more than a rubber stamp for many of the projects coming through the doors. Now we know who to blame for the mcmansionization of LA.
Keeping with the harsh tone of the draft audit obtained two weeks ago by the L.A. Weekly, Chick found building inspectors who are pressured by higher-ups and others to avoid writing orders to correct code violations. Sometimes, when inspectors do issue orders, repeat offenders thumb their noses without penalty.
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"There are problems just waiting to erupt,” she said. “Whether pressure [to avoid enforcement] is political, comes from developers or from supervisors, all of that is wrong, and it should stop.” Evidence abounds that the situation is out of hand. On Monday, as Chick was releasing her audit, more than 40 McMansions were under construction in a 10-block area of Laurel Canyon, where neighbors have screamed themselves hoarse over what they see as violations of city laws and the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). At four of the building sites, neighbors observed construction under way on Sunday, a violation of city law.
Naturally, the story reminded us of the garagemajal under construction on Doheny, that despite setback requirements seemed to be on top of the street. We wonder who got the owner of the home a favor from Building & Safety in order to approve this monstrosity. UPDATE: The site of the Garagemajal is in the City of Los Angeles, as indicated in accompanying ZIMAS map. The white area is WeHo.
· The Human Teardown [LA Weekly]
· Garagemajal has Neighbors Fuming [Curbed LA]