At first, business owner Peter Messinger harbored dark suspicions about the true, but perhaps hidden, purpose of the letter he was reading with a measure of disbelief.
For a year and a half, the owner of The Aquarium, at the corner of Sepulveda Boulevard and Sawtelle, was one of the most vocally aggressive merchants on South Sepulveda fighting a huge redevelopment plan.
Enlisting colleagues, Mr. Messinger devoted a portion of every day to attempting to thwart, if not kill, a neighborhood teardown and rebuild being proposed by the developer Bob Champion.
Perhaps surprisingly, with much of Culver City signaling support, he and his many business and residential allies succeeded.
Out in the Open
Almost a month ago, on Sept. 17, the City Council made (sort of) official what had been apparent since late June — the vaunted 12 1/2-acre proposed project was off, probably for a few years.
Shortly, City Hall would take steps to formally terminate the one-year exclusive negotiation compact with Mr. Champion, who was at once controversial, charismatic, praised and just as vigorously vilified.
For all of these reasons, Mr. Messinger was both curious and annoyed when a three-paragraph letter, dated Oct. 3, arrived this week from the Community Development Dept. at City Hall.
At Last, the Purpose
In the next to last sentence, Mr. Messinger — not by name — was invited to attend the Redevelopment Agency meeting at City Hall at 7 p.m. on Monday, Oct. 22. That evening, the City Council, sitting as the Redevelopment Agency, officially will vote to terminate the exclusive development agreement with Mr. Champion.
That will close the coffin on the almost unanimously protested scheme to completely overturn the west side of South Sepulveda, from Jefferson to Sawtelle.
But didn’t they shut the coffin last month?
In different words, the action of the Agency on Oct. 22 will fulfill a legal technicality.
Some Recipients Shaken
Meanwhile, however, the letter annoyed, scared and confused many of the 2300 merchants, commercial and residential landowners to whom City Hall mailed the message.
They reacted by telephoning Joe Susca, the Redevelopment Project Manager in the Community Development Dept., who co-signed the letter with Christopher Evans, Management Analyst.
Mr. Susca explained the apparent miscommunication this afternoon.
For legal reasons, the Council/Agency could not have voted for closure on the Champion agreement on the night of Sept. 17 because the law prohibits members from voting on an item not on the agenda.
Being Suspicious
Mr. Messinger sounded slightly relieved when he learned the real reason behind the letter.
“By saying publicly that the Champion agreement was off, when in private it actually was not, I had thought that was the city government’s way of getting all of us to stop organizing and meeting,” Mr. Messinger said.
The erstwhile developer has faded but good from Culver City. Mr. Champion, normally talkative, personable and accessible, has not returned telephone calls for three weeks.