Westwood Ca

For most of the last century, axes and saws carved a healthy living from the forest around this old lumber town. Now, years after logging declined and the mill closed, a developer envisions ski trails snaking their way through the remaining trees on Dyer Mountain.

If all had gone according to plan, construction would have finished five months ago on a gleaming new hospital at UCLA's Westwood campus, a state-of-the-art facility covered in 15,000 stone panels quarried in Italy. Instead, the $677.7-million project has bogged down, with regulators faulting unapproved work on the site and contractors claiming they are owed $100 million for delays and changes.

Flanking Wilshire Boulevard in Westwood is a glamorous mix of multifamily residences ranging from basic to ultra-luxurious. Elegant high-rise condominiums, some clad in granite, provide jaw-dropping views from the Pacific to downtown. They share the stretch with a variety of apartments, a few hotels and a handful of churches and synagogues.

Alan Casden is not one to back down. Over the years, the multimillionaire developer has sued a raft of business associates who have displeased him. One business partner -- who happens to be his brother -- says Casden openly mocked him. At a bar mitzvah party for oil tycoon Marvin Davis' grandson, Casden shoved his wife as worried guests looked on, she has said in court papers.

A contentious $100-million project in Westwood cleared an important hurdle Wednesday after community activists and the developer resolved a final divisive issue. In last-minute negotiations refereed by Councilman Jack Weiss' office, developer Alan Casden's representatives bowed to community insistence that Glendon Avenue remain open during construction of the mixed-use project in Westwood Village.

For more than three decades, Los Angeles protesters have flung their passionate objections against the hard, cold walls of a concrete-colored building in Westwood. Thousands have yelled at it. Others have read insulting poetry to it. Angry women have disrobed before it. One motorist rammed it. The Federal Building has weathered scores of protests staged on its grounds each year.

Federal officials hope to build a new Los Angeles headquarters for the FBI in Westwood, but some residents fear the massive building would make their neighborhood a target for terrorists, and squeeze more cars into an area already struggling with traffic gridlock. "It's like drawing a big bull's-eye on Westwood for the terrorists," said Laura Lake, president of two community advocacy groups. "And how are ... agents even going to get to work?

A former Los Angeles community activist who contested a controversial Westwood development voted on the project after she was appointed to the local planning commission without alerting her fellow commissioners to her possible conflict of interest. Joyce Foster was appointed in September to the West Los Angeles Area Planning Commission, which is one of seven regional panels charged with reviewing development in Los Angeles.

Faced with opposition from City Councilman Jack Weiss and homeowner groups Thursday, the Los Angeles Planning Commission delayed approving a $100-million complex of apartments and shops in Westwood Village to give critics a chance to work out a compromise with developer Alan Casden. With opponents saying that the Palazzo Westwood project would be too big for the village and that a planned street closing would make traffic worse, some commissioners sounded doubtful that the two sides could agree.

Los Angeles city planners on Friday recommended approval, with conditions, of a $100-million residential and commercial development in Westwood Village that has pitted community activists against multimillionaire developer Alan Casden. The project, Palazzo Westwood, is scheduled to come before the city Planning Commission on Feb. 12. The project also faces scrutiny by the City Council and its Planning and Land Use Committee.