Beverly Hills Unified School District Files CEQA Lawsuit Challenging Westside Subway Extension Route Under Beverly Hills High School

Lawsuit seeks to force Metro to reconsider Santa Monica Boulevard alignment

LOS ANGELES, May 30, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- The Beverly Hills Unified School District ("BHUSD") today filed a lawsuit in Los Angeles Superior Court asking a judge to set aside the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transit Authority ("Metro") approval of the Final EIS/EIR for the Westside Subway Extension Project. The lawsuit was filed under the California Environmental Quality Act ("CEQA"), which requires that government agencies such as Metro consider environmental consequences before certifying or approving projects like the Westside Subway Extension.

According to the lawsuit, Metro failed to comply with CEQA "due to a rush-to-judgment" in locating the Westside Subway Extension station in Century City at Constellation Boulevard. The lawsuit alleges that the Metro Board made its decision without considering the full and complete information about alternatives needed to adequately make an informed choice.

"This has been a biased and flawed process from the beginning. Metro decided long ago that it wanted to put the Century City station at Constellation and it has refused to review or consider any other options," stated Brian Goldberg, president of the BHUSD Board of Education.

The lawsuit provides details describing how Metro "secretly pre-committed to the Constellation Station long before all the evidence was in (and even before it released the Draft EIS/EIR) by only providing information to the [Federal Transportation Administration] for the New Starts process for a Constellation Station, even though the [locally preferred alternative] included both Santa Monica Boulevard and Constellation Boulevard alternative alignments and stations for Century City. Metro appeared to have selected the Constellation alternative more than a year and a half earlier and all of the reports Metro has prepared and issued since appeared to be a slanted, post hoc rationalization for that decision."

According to the lawsuit, Metro also used potentially flawed and erroneous studies to discredit and rule out a potential station location at Santa Monica Boulevard and Avenue of the Stars because it favored a Constellation station location. The lawsuit points to the fact that numerous geologists and other experts have questioned Metro's seismic studies and findings because, among other things, they involved no soil dating work or open trenching, the only reliable method to determine active faulting. Goldberg also noted that, "BHUSD's experts are convinced, and their studies have proven, that a Santa Monica Boulevard station location would be a safe and viable option."

Metro made the decision to choose the Constellation Boulevard station contrary to the best interests of the public, according to the lawsuit, because "the Draft EIS/EIR determined that the Santa Monica Boulevard Station would have a higher ridership than Constellation, cost at least $60 million less than Constellation, and shorten travel time since Santa Monica provided a more direct route than Constellation -- all positive benefits achieved without tunneling under Beverly Hills High School."

Kevin Brogan, attorney for the BHUSD, added that Metro forced the lawsuit because of its insistence on moving forward and voting on the project prior to the completion of all relevant scientific studies. "The BHUSD supports the Westside Subway Extension and did not want to file this lawsuit. But Metro's purported consideration of the Santa Monica Boulevard station location was nothing more than lip service, and its headlong rush to approve the alignment before all studies were finalized left BHUSD no choice," said Brogan.

Goldberg echoing Brogan's sentiment on the need to file the lawsuit, stated "the BHUSD did not want to file this lawsuit. Today's action is a direct result of Metro's intransigence, and is the only option available to have an open, honest and fair hearing to protect BHHS. The unnecessary cost and delay of litigation could have been prevented if the Metro Board had only listened to the numerous experts that testified before them, and ordered that additional testing be undertaken to prove once and for all what would be the safest alternative for the Century City Subway station."

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BHUSD VOWS TO CONTINUE TO FIGHT AGAINT THE ROUTING OF THE WESTSIDE SUBWAY EXTENSION UNDER BEVERLY HILLS HIGH SCHOOL

LOS ANGELES (May 24, 2012) – Beverly Hills Unified School District (BHUSD) Board of Education President Brian Goldberg made the following comments regarding the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority (Metro) decision on routing for the Westside Subway Extension:

We are disappointed that the Metro board made this decision, but it was expected. It has been clear that this was a biased process from the very beginning. Metro decided long ago that it wanted to put the Century City station at Constellation and it is spending a considerable amount of taxpayer money to do just that.

Today’s decision is further evidence of Metro’s continuing reckless disregard for both the process of law and for the citizens whose tax dollars are being squandered pushing through an unnecessary alignment when viable alternatives can provide better service at lower cost.

We have not given up this fight and will pursue all means available to protect Beverly Hills High School from what we see as a threat to its very survival.

BEVERLY HILLS UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT URGES METRO BOARD TO DEFER DECISION ON WESTSIDE SUBWAY EXTENSION SO SCIENTIFIC EXPERTS CAN RECONCILE CONFLICTING DATA, CONCLUSIONS

Members of the Metro Board of Directors

Los Angeles Metropolitan Transportation Authority

One Gateway Plaza

Los Angeles, CA 90012-2952

Re:         FEIS/EIR on Westside Subway Extension Project

Dear Honorable Chair and Members of the Metro Board:

At the May 17, 2012 hearing, conducted pursuant to Public Utilities Code Section 20639, the City of Beverly Hills presented compelling expert testimony establishing that the West Beverly Hills Lineament was formed by erosion, not faulting, and that the claimed faults plotted (and replotted) by Parsons Brinckerhoff on the Beverly Hills Lineament and the Santa Monica Fault Zone were either nonexistent or occurred well before the Holocene Period, rendering them likely inactive and irrelevant for the purpose of Alquist-Priolo.

Both the quality and quantity of expert commentary on these issues conclusively demonstrates that further scientific investigation is warranted to confirm the viability of both the Constellation Station and Santa Monica Boulevard Station alternatives from a seismic perspective. This investigation may include both borings and trenching based on site availability, etc.  The precise location and testing methodology required can quickly be developed by the scientists given their current familiarity with the site.

The Beverly Hills Unified School District requests the Metro Board defer any further approvals on the Project and immediately convene a meeting of all retained expert geologists who have studied these locations, including geologists from the California Geological Survey to formulate a consensus on the appropriate testing protocol necessary to resolve the outstanding pertinent questions.

Very truly yours,

Kevin H. Brogan

of Hill Farrer & Burrell LLP

Geologists, Engineers Dispute Metro's Seismic Claims About Westside Subway Extension Through Century City

Data Does Not Support Need To Tunnel Under Beverly Hills High School

LOS ANGELES, May 17, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- After months of exhaustive study, a team of geologists and engineers today concluded that many of the claims made by the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority (Metro) about the need to build a subway tunnel under Beverly Hills High School do not hold up to scientific scrutiny.

The conclusions, described today during a public hearing, cast doubt on Metro's assertion that the only viable route for the Westside Subway Extension through Century City is an alignment that tunnels directly under aging classrooms at Beverly Hills' only public high school.

"Today the city of Beverly Hills and the Beverly Hills Unified School District (BHUSD) were finally able to commence a serious discussion about the proposed subway station location in Century City," said BHUSD attorney Kevin Brogan. "Highly respected experts in geology, seismology, subway construction and school construction testified that the facts they uncovered differ substantially from the conclusions reached by Metro and its contractors. Given these findings, we anticipate and expect a full and careful consideration of an alignment that protects the city's only public high school from unnecessary risk and disruption."

The city and BHUSD support the Westside Subway Extension – two stations along the $5.3-billion project would be built within the city limits – but oppose Metro's current alignment under the campus because it would severely restrict the district's ability to modernize and expand as required by a voter-approved bond measure.

Experts from Leighton Consulting, Kenney GeoScience, Earth Consultants International and Primesource Consulting conducted extensive new testing under the direction of the California Geological Survey that included significant trenching, one of the most definitive methods for determining the existence of geologic faults. They also conducted a thorough review of existing data about the geologic conditions in Beverly Hills and Century City.

They concluded:

• Faults identified by Metro consultants on the Beverly Hills High School campus do not exist or are inactive, a finding verified by the California Geological Survey.
• Faults that were identified by Metro consultants along Santa Monica Boulevard, long the preferred route between Beverly Hills and Westwood, should be classified as inactive because they have not ruptured in the past 11,000 years.

"What we demonstrated today is that all of the data Metro uses to justify an unnecessary alignment is suspect and simply does not stand up to serious scrutiny," said Tim Buresh, the district's lead engineer studying Metro's proposed alignments. "Early projections by Metro showed that a Santa Monica alignment would be cheaper to build and serve more riders, but those considerations were brushed aside to move the station at taxpayer expense by claiming faults made it too dangerous to build along Santa Monica. Today, we are demonstrating that those conclusions are flawed, and we expect additional studies to only bolster our findings. It is entirely possible for Metro to serve more riders and save taxpayers money without tunneling under Beverly Hills High School."

SOURCE Beverly Hills Unified School District

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Preview: Beverly Hills Scientific Studies

On Thursday, May 17th, Beverly Hills will present its scientific studies relating to the Century City subway in a hearing before the Metro Board from 1:30 to 5 p.m. The hearing will be held in the Metro Board Room at 1 Gateway Plaza in downtown Los Angeles.

For a preview of the data to be discussed, read Leighton Consulting Inc.'s summary of its findings at the link below.

FAULT HAZARD ASSESSMENT OF THE WEST BEVERLY HILLS LINEAMENT [PDF - 37 pages]