2ndpchabove_0 In his first public push for the Second+PCH project since the release of the proposal’s second Environmental Impact Report, developer David Malmuth revealed his new strategy for getting the massive retail/hotel/residential consortium through the myriad zoning laws it would currently violate. Simply rewrite the laws!

“We have to amend SEADIP,” Malmuth said, referring to the Southeast Area Development and Improvement Plan, which has governed the height, density and environmental considerations of development on the eastern side of Long Beach since it was approved by the Coastal Commission in 1980. “It will have to be amended in order to enable this project.”

Malmuth made this rather stunning revelation Thursday to about 60 lunchtime attendees at 3rd District Councilman Gary DeLong’s Neighborhood Association meeting at McKenna’s By The Bay restaurant—which, despite accusations of exclusivity from some residents, appeared to accommodate everyone.

But in an interview with GreaterLongBeach.com before the March 10 release of Second+PCH’s recirculated EIR (the first was widely deemed substandard, withdrawn and rewritten), Malmuth had outlined a similar plan when asked if the project would seek zoning variances for such elements as a 12-story hotel in an area where the height limit is 35 feet.

“We’re not actually asking for any variances,” Malmuth said then. “What’s formally happening is that we’re amending SEADIP—or Subarea 17 of SEADIP, which is where we’re located—in order to enable the project.”

The development team made this sound simple on Thursday—essentially a matter of preparing language to that effect and presenting it to the Planning Commission and then to the City Council.

But it may be more problematic than that. Although some parts of SEADIP were never certified by the Coastal Commission, other parts—including those governing Subarea 17—were certified as part of Long Beach’s Local Coastal Plan (LCP).

Local attorney Mel Nutter, a former chairman of the California Coastal Commission, says this creates a much longer procedural path.

“The fact is, to proceed with the Second+PCH project this way, they would have to have a complete amendment to the LCP,” said Nutter. “The city would have to process this amendment and submit it to the Coastal Commission for approval before anything could go forward.”

Although frequently maligned by those in favor of removing restrictions on development on the east side of Long Beach, SEADIP is actually a remarkable document that was born in the 1970s from a partnership that consisted of city officials, residents, businesses and property owners.

Their collaboration on a consensus for zoning was triggered by the construction of the Galaxy Towers, the blue high-rise residential tower that was constructed on Ocean Blvd. across the street from Bluff Park and in the midst of a grand waterfront neighborhood. But the various stakeholders spent years hammering out the final document, which gave priority to environmental factors, emphasized low-rise and low-density development and park-like settings that emphasized a lifestyle friendly to cycling and pedestrians.

Malmuth is not swayed by that history.

“Amendments to zoning laws happen all the time,” he told GreaterLongBeach.com. “There have been instances where decisionmakers feel that, for whatever reason, this project is an acceptable project under the conditions of the amendment.”

Malmuth emphasized that the amendments to SEADIP would apply only to Second+PCH, and said he doubted they would establish a precedent that would enable other developers in other areas covered by SEADIP to also build big, new projects.

“The amendments have to be very specific; they can’t just allow anything,” Malmuth said. “They have to allow the project as proposed. They will apply only to Subarea 17 [of SEADIP], which is where we are located.”

On the other hand, Malmuth also suggested that amending SEADIP to permit the Second+PCH development might trigger a general review and rewrite of the document, which he believes is overdue and would be a public service.

“The broader issue of SEADIP, I think, is important,” he said. “You know, it’s a 30-plus-year-old document. It’s never been amended, although under coastal law it’s supposed to be amended every five years. So there’s a sense that it’s appropriate to look at it again. I think Gary [DeLong]tried to do that awhile back and didn’t get a lot of traction.”

DeLong did begin a process to amend SEADIP shortly after beginning his first term in office in 2006, but that effort was discontinued under accusations of secrecy and favoritism.

Malmuth indicated no interest in waiting through an amendment process like the one that engendered SEADIP—a time-consuming effort that would comprehensively review and rewrite the document before permitting development that drastically violates it. But he wouldn’t mind such a process after Second+PCH is constructed.

“We would have hoped that SEADIP could be redone, but that’s not under our control—that’s under the city’s control,” he said. “We don’t want to be held hostage to the fact that the entire document has not been redone—although we think it should be; we think that’s an entirely appropriate thing to do.

“And we would like to figure out some linkage between doing our project and potentially, through mitigation dollars, find the funding to redo the document. The Coastal Commission is going to have some kind of mitigation that they place on our project, so there’s some possible linkage there. Because the Coastal Commission would like to see SEADIP redone as well. They think that would be beneficial for all future development.”

Malmuth conceded that, in a perfect world, the zoning laws would be redone first so as to permit a project that was in accordance with them.

“Yeah. But it’s not gonna happen that way,” he said. “So, we have the facts on the ground and we have to try to figure out which is the best way to proceed.”