He Fights to Keep Grip on Project : Montevideo Country Club: The project's architect remains undaunted despite a series of setbacks.

By STEVE PADILLA

June 2, 1991 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

Despite the odds, Christopher Wojciechowski remains confident.

Nevermind that, after 13 years of buying land, planning and lobbying, he still has not received permits to build his proposed Montevideo Country Club in rustic Topanga Canyon.

Nevermind that he has filed for bankruptcy--listing $28 million in debts--or that he is looking for an investor to pump $145 million into the project to get it back on track.

Nevermind that a bankruptcy court judge recently approved a reorganization plan put forward by his business partner that would wrest control of the project away from Wojciechowski and, possibly, leave him out of the picture entirely.

The hard-charging Wojciechowski remains upbeat. “We’ve had our share of bad days with Montevideo,” he said, “but the good ones are coming.”

They can’t get much worse.

The Montevideo Country Club has become one of the longest and most contentious development disputes in Los Angeles County history. The project’s latest development plan calls for 97 houses, an 18-hole golf course, 120-horse equestrian center, tennis courts, country club and hotel on 257 acres.

The case has produced more than 30 public hearings, has spawned lawsuits by and against Wojciechowski and has pitted neighbor against neighbor in Topanga Canyon.

“An extraordinary situation,” Joan Cooper, a Topanga Canyon resident who is one of Wojciechowski’s supporters, said of the case. “Incredible.”

County planning officials and Topanga Canyon residents say they could write books about the whole mess. If such a book comes to pass, surely the dominating character will be Wojciechowski--a ruddy-faced son of a Polish cavalry officer--who speaks his mind no matter who he offends.

To some, he is a victim of an unfair and capricious political system. To others, he is an arrogant manipulator who has influenced that system with hefty campaign contributions to the Board of Supervisors.

Some residents who are project supporters say Montevideo will enhance the canyon. Opponents, who admit Wojciechowski has a right to build something, say his project is too large, poorly designed and not suitable for the scenic canyon.

Most agree, however, that Wojciechowski (pronounced voy-ja-HOW-skee) is plain-spoken, blunt and sometimes offensive. “If I were his public relations agent, I certainly would not run the show the way he’s doing it,” conceded one supporter.

Wojciechowski, an architect, admitted he is not shy. “I’m fearless,” he said, smiling.

Indeed. His style is documented in angry letters he has written over the years to newspapers, planning officials and the supervisors who have the power to reject his project. The letters, some contained in court documents or county planning files, come right to the point:

* Angered that Supervisor Mike Antonovich voted to scale down the Montevideo project shortly before an election, Wojciechowski wrote: “This was designed to save your ass and fry mine.” He demanded that Antonovich approve his original plan. “I assume you have the guts to do that.”

* Complaining that Supervisor Deane Dana also voted to scale back his project, he wrote: “You have turned a true and loyal friend into an enemy by your inattention to detail.”

* In notes scribbled on court documents, he pleaded with a bankruptcy judge to reject his partner’s reorganization plan, saying it was “a criminal act a la the S&L; swindle or the junk bond disaster. . . . If this is what this country’s bankruptcy laws are all about, I’ll take anarchy.”

* From a letter to the county’s chief planner: “Your position as head planner of the fastest-growing and most desirable county in the U.S.A. should be filled by someone who understands that job. You obviously do not. Therefore, you should seek employment elsewhere. Perhaps Havana, Cuba, could use your talents.”

Wojciechowski makes no apology for his letters. “It’s not a hotheaded response,” he said. “That’s what I believe in.”

The foundations of those beliefs were laid in his native Poland, where he was born in 1934. His father, Zygmunt Wojciechowski, was a Polish cavalry officer in World War I and served as the chief of staff for the remnants of the Polish Air Force based in England after Poland was overrun by the Nazis before World War II, he said.

The elder Wojciechowski was in Paris when the Nazi invasion took place. Christopher Wojciechowski, then 5, and the family could not join him in England until 1941. The family moved to Washington, D.C., when his father took a post with the Polish embassy there.

The family never returned to Poland after the war. “Our land was taken away from us by the Communists,” he said. The memories resonate during his fight for Montevideo. “That’s why I’m so determined.”

Wojciechowski has branded the well-organized opponents of Montevideo as “commissars” and charged that “Marxist hurdles” have impeded his plans.

After Antonovich voted in 1988 against his plans for a hotel on the country club site, Wojciechowski issued a news release saying Antonovich, then in a runoff election with Baxter Ward, eliminated the hotel to appease Topanga Canyon voters. Such a strategy made little sense, he went on, because “these are all liberals and would never vote for Antonovich even if he changed his name to Karl Marx and wore red stars on his underwear.”

His tactics have hurt him.

He built up “a mountain of ill will” in the county’s Regional Planning Department, said Clinton C. Ternstrom, a former county planning commissioner.

Wojciechowski might have won over more Topanga Canyon residents if he had been less rude and more reasonable, several residents said. “I think he’s been his own worst enemy,” said Keefer Flanner, a canyon resident.

Flanner sued Wojciechowski a few years ago after the architect erected a chain-link fence along his property line that came so close to Flanner’s driveway that it prevented him from turning his car around. The lawsuit is still pending over what residents have dubbed the “spite fence.”

“I’m not going to sit here and say he’s the easiest person to work with, but in a lot of ways he is easy to work with in that you know where he’s coming from,” said David Vannatta, Antonovich’s chief planning deputy. “He’s not anything but straightforward and upfront.”

Vannatta should know. In a news release complaining about his treatment at the hands of the county, Wojciechowski said: “Vannatta makes a mess of everything he touches. I told Mike to fire him on several occasions.”

But supporter Cooper said Wojciechowski’s personality is beside the point. “However he says things, that really isn’t the issue,” she said.

These days the main issues are financial. And they are daunting.

Wojciechowski first obtained options to buy property in Topanga Canyon in 1978, and by 1986 his Montevideo Partnership had acquired 657 acres--257 for the country club project and 400 for a future housing development--for about $12 million.

Wojciechowski’s limited partner in the Montevideo Partnership was Sharon Disney Lund, an old schoolmate from USC who lent him $5 million. Lund is the daughter of Walt Disney.

But debts built up during the delays and in 1989, after Lund and other creditors threatened to foreclose, Wojciechowski placed the partnership into Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

Last year, Wojciechowski found a potential buyer to bring the company out of the red, but the Japan-based Tohshin Co. pulled out partly because of strong community opposition to the project. The Topanga Assn. for a Scenic Community deluged the company with about 1,000 postcards protesting the country club.

In recent months, Wojciechowski circulated a proposal calling for a $145-million construction and investment loan to build the project and buy out Lund. He said he has some investors lined up.

But on May 10, Judge William J. Lasarow in U.S. Bankruptcy Court approved the reorganization plan that would transfer control of the Montevideo Partnership to Lund.

In his trademark style, he had written a note to the judge before the ruling: “Please do not confirm this plan. We will be wiped out by it.”

Lund declined to comment. Her attorney, Ronald E. Gother, said he could not predict what role Wojciechowski would play in the project in the future.

Gother said, however, that Lund is still committed to building a country club on the site.

The judge’s decision, delivered from the bench, will not become final until he signs documents enacting his ruling. Wojciechowski said he will appeal and said his attorneys were not properly notified of the May 10 hearing.

But even if Wojciechowski remains in command, some wonder if he can find an investor while the bankruptcy lingers and the county permits remain unapproved. “Nobody’s going to buy it from him if they think they can get it in a foreclosure sale,” said Wayne Northrop, a project opponent.

Some real estate experts, who asked not to be identified, said his plans to sell 97 homes at $2 million apiece are overly optimistic.

How did the project drag on for so long? Opinions vary.

“They keep throwing hurdles in front of him,” complained Wojciechowski supporter Cooper. “It’s been a sad experience to watch government serve in this manner.”

Bob Goldberg, who spearheaded the fight against Montevideo, said Wojciechowski caused many of the delays himself because he did not comply with county requests for additional studies or information. Like Cooper, Goldberg complained about county government, but from a different perspective.

“It’s checkbook politics,” he said, suggesting Wojciechowski’s campaign contributions have influenced the county’s handling of the project. According to public records, Wojciechowski gave more than $66,000 to the Board of Supervisors between 1986 and 1990, with nearly half going to Antonovich.

Antonovich came to Wojciechowski’s rescue in April after the supervisors, with Antonovich absent, denied permits for Montevideo, apparently killing it. Supervisor Ed Edelman, who had voted three years earlier to grant the permits, led the vote against it. Edelman recently added Topanga Canyon to his district through a court-ordered redistricting.

Antonovich complained that the board had indicated its intent to approve the project in 1988. By rejecting it in April, he said, the board was going back on its word.

So two weeks later, at the urging of Antonovich, the board agreed to reconsider the project and sent it back to the Regional Planning Commission for yet another hearing. The project may not return to the supervisors until next year.

Wojciechowski said he can wait. “It’s just a blink of an eye in Montevideo’s time.”

Montevideo--A 13-Year Saga For more than a decade, Christopher Wojciechowski and his company, the Montevideo Partnership, have tried to develop hundreds of acres of vacant land nestled in the Santa Monica Mountains in Topanga Canyon. Highlights of the controversy:

Oct. 16, 1978: Wojciechowski files permit requests with Los Angeles County for a development project in Topanga Canyon. Two years later, he unveils ambitious plans for a country club, hotel, golf course and commercial center.

April 6, 1986: The Montevideo Partnership completes acquisition of 657 acres in Topanga Canyon--257 for the country club project and 400 for a future housing development. Planning and politicking--by opponents and proponents of the project--now begin in earnest.

Jan. 8, 1988: A Superior Court judge throws out a lawsuit Wojciechowski filed against the Topanga Assn. for a Scenic Community, a project opponent, which accused the group of abuse and conspiracy. Judge says the $1-million complaint lacks merit.

Jan. 19, 1988: The Regional Planning Commission votes 3 to 2 to scale back the Montevideo Country Club, rejecting a 220-room hotel and 17,000-square-foot shopping center. It approves 224 houses, an equestrian center, tennis courts and a golf course. The case goes to the Board of Supervisors.

Aug. 4, 1988: The supervisors declare their intent to approve another scaled-down version of the country club--with 125 houses, equestrian center, tennis courts and golf course. The supervisors also reject the hotel and request additional planning studies for the project to win final approval.

Jan. 5, 1989: Montevideo Country Club sues the supervisors, accusing the county of causing unreasonable and costly delays while processing the case. The suit is pending.

Dec. 5, 1989: The Montevideo Partnership, saddled with debt caused partly by the delays, files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, listing debts of $28 million.

April 18, 1991: The Board of Supervisors, with Mike Antonovich absent, reject another version of the country club on a 3-1 vote. The dispute appears to be over, but Antonovich accuses the board of “trying to usurp the rights” of property owners and calls for a new vote.

April 30, 1991: The supervisors, at Antonovich’s request, reverse themselves and vote 3 to 2 to reconsider the project. The board sends the project back to the Regional Planning Commission for another public hearing.