Next week, the Central Los Angeles Area Planning Commission is scheduled to take up an appeal seeking to block the construction of a mixed-use development in the Westlake neighborhood.

Last year, Telluride Holdings, LLC obtained entitlements to redevelop a small apartment complex, a medical clinic, and an office building at Wilshire Boulevard and Union Street with a new seven-story structure containing 85 apartments, approximately 7,000 square feet of ground-floor retail, and parking for 105 vehicles.

Michael Maltzan Architecture is designing the project, which would offer a mix of studio, one-, and two-bedroom apartments - including 12 affordable units.  The building would use a series of setbacks and insets to create courtyards and terrace decks for its residents.

The project appellant, listed as the Coalition for an Equitable Westlake MacArthur Park, argues that the project should have not been granted a Class 32 Categorical Exemption to the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), a designation which an applicant to forego an environmental impact report.  The appellant's representative contends that the proposed development - in addition to several large projects that are either planned or approved in the surrounding neighborhood - warrant further study.

A staff response notes that other projects in the area, such as the Lake on Wilshire and the proposed condominium building at 1150 Wilshire, have been improved in conjunction with Mitigated Negative Declarations, and thus have already been studied through of CEQA.  The report recommends that the Area Planning Commission should deny the appeal and sustain the project's approvals.