‘We Deserve Better’: West Hollywood Approves Shoreham Drive Project 6-1

West Hollywood’s Planning Commission has been here before. A density bonus project comes in. The neighborhood pushes back. The commissioners raise concerns. Then they vote yes, because the alternative is a lawsuit the city will lose and fines the city will pay. Thursday night was no different. 8760 Shoreham Drive, a site that has been in some stage of development fight for more than two decades, was approved 6-1. Commissioner Lynn Hoopingarner voted no. Her closing remark: “We deserve better.”

It wasn’t her first conscience vote on a project like this one. It probably won’t be her last. What’s changing is how openly the commission is saying the quiet part.

“It can be challenging, and sometimes frustrating to make decisions about things like this,” Vice Chair Stacy Jones said, “because it doesn’t always feel like a choice.”

Jones wasn’t wrong about that. Under California’s Housing Accountability Act, voting no on a qualifying project without written safety findings opens a city to lawsuits it will probably lose, attorney fees, and fines of at least $10,000 per unit. Other cities have gone that route. Most have paid for it. This project met the standard. Commissioners who raised real concerns about fire safety, parking, and affordable housing voted yes.

Hoopingarner said out loud that she couldn’t make the safety finding. It’s in the official record now. Whether that matters down the road nobody at the hearing addressed. The city can argue it was legally compelled to approve. The developer can’t make that argument. The commission’s stated concerns are on file.

The project, filed by developer Shoreham Capital L.P. through applicant representative Brandon Zavala of Afriat Consulting Group, will demolish the vacant 1938 commercial building at the corner of Shoreham Drive and Sherbourne Drive and replace it with a six-story, 22-unit apartment building above a subterranean garage. It’s twice the size of the version that sat approved and unbuilt for three years. Shoreham Capital has owned the property since 2003. Three of the 22 units are reserved as affordable housing. The building includes 23 parking spaces.

The neighborhood was still fighting. WeHo Heights residents sent in letters about fire evacuation, parking, and the density of a hillside already designated a Very High Fire Hazard Severity Zone. WEHOonline reported in February on a dispute over a January virtual neighborhood meeting that residents said was designed to prevent real dialogue. By Thursday night the commission had received opposition from the neighborhood association, individual residents along Shoreham Drive, and a UCLA professor who spent months pressing the developer on what he called an unanswered ethical question about building high-density housing in a fire zone. 

Laura Meltzer lives directly across the street. She said she wasn’t there to oppose the project. “In the event of a fire, people getting in their cars on a very narrow street, it becomes a nightmare,” Meltzer said. “Horn is effectively one lane between Shoreham and Sunset, because of the diagonal parking.”

None of it changed the outcome.

Hoopingarner’s dissent

Hoopingarner said she couldn’t make the required safety finding and she wasn’t going to pretend otherwise. “I do not make the finding that this project does not present a safety hazard to our neighbors, when all it will take is one UPS, Amazon, FedEx, DHL, or moving van to block both emergency access and resident egress on this very narrow street,” Hoopingarner said.

She said the five unprogrammed amenity spaces will become housing units, as she said happened at the Hayworth project earlier this year. “They’re gonna be units,” Hoopingarner said. “And they’re gonna be housing units without providing any additional affordable housing.” If they are, the building’s affordable unit percentage drops from 13% to roughly 11%. She called it a 39-bedroom luxury building with 23 parking spaces in a fire zone. “That’s five additional luxury units that combined are gonna be renting for about $40,000 a month,” Hoopingarner said.

She noted the City downzoned the neighborhood to R4A during the 2011 General Plan update to manage density and fire hazard. Those conditions have gotten worse, she said, and the City hasn’t responded with more than updated building codes. “The state may have given developers a very large gun to point at our heads, but I for one refuse to be forced to pull the trigger, and destroy yet another neighborhood in exchange for 5,000 square feet of amenity rooms that will do nothing to address the actual affordable housing problem,” Hoopingarner said. “I will be voting my conscience,” she said.

The rest of the vote

Jones said she personally evacuated the neighborhood during the January 2025 fires and understood what the letters were about. She voted yes anyway. Commissioner Jesi Harris said she pulled census data and found vehicle ownership in the tract runs roughly half and half. She said she’s seen worse parking ratios. She still wanted the public to have better data on street pressure. “I would like for members of the public to be able to see data related to what happens with the pressures on the street,” Harris said. Chair David Gregoire said two-bedroom units with one parking space tend to fall short in his experience. He voted to approve. “I do question sometimes the financial viability of any of these luxury units that don’t have adequate parking,” Gregoire said.

Zavala said construction’s expected to take 18 to 24 months.

Hoopingarner had one more thing. “While many may argue that any housing is better than nothing, I don’t concur,” she said. “Not at the cost of public safety. Not at the cost of more luxury housing and less affordable housing.”