VAPP Re-Zoning Hearing Jan 22, 2026

The LA City Planning Commission will hear LASAN’s request to re-zone the proposed Hurricane St VAPP and parking lot sites on Thursday, Jan 22nd @ 8:30a (or later) at the Van Nuys City Hall Council Chamber – 14410 Sylvan St, 2nd Floor, Van Nuys. These motions are first on the agenda.

LA Planning Commission Meeting Agenda – Jan 22, 2026

This hearing is your final opportunity to materially impact this project before construction begins late 2026/early 2027. Don’t fool yourself into believing you (or anyone) will be able to cause changes later to lessen the impact on your quality of life.
Speak now or forever hold your peace.

What Can/Should You Do?

  1. Send an email to the Planning Commission (cpc@lacity.org) no later than 8:30a Tuesday Jan 20th. Select any/all issues from the list below. You can send up to 10 pages as well as photos (not included towards page limits). Use the text below or (even better) modify it to add your own voice.
    • Start your email with something like: “While I acknowledge the the proposed VAPP (Case No. CPC-2024-2010-GPA-ZC-SPPC-CU3) is a critical infrastructure project, the city has an obligation to reasonably mitigate the impact to neighborhood residents and the surrounding environment. The project, in its current form, does neither. I am therefore requesting the Planning Commission condition your approval with the following enforceable protections:
    • Note: Submissions may continue to be made after the deadline above until the Chair closes public comment the day of the hearing (two page limit plus photos). Realistically, any written submission sent day of the hearing is far less likely to be read.
  2. Speak in person at the hearing: This will make the greatest impact. We will be carpooling to the hearing.
  3. Speak remotely during the hearing: Participate via Zoom or dial-in (213) 338-8477 or (669) 900-9128. Meeting ID: 824 1819 5010, Passcode: 967614.

Important: Whether you attend the hearing in person or participate remotely, community members are given only one (1) minute to speak. Consider writing out your comments for maximum impact!

Overview & History

  • Mitigating the project impact on our community and the environment should be paramount, not treated as throwaway considerations.
  • The VAPP Project will have a significant, negative impact on our densely populated Venice community as well as the surrounding environment including the Grand Canal and Ballona Lagoon, both recognized as ESHAs (Environmentally Sensitive Habitat Areas)
  • We are not against this infrastructure project. While acknowledging its critical nature, our goal has always been to incorporate reasonable modifications that will materially lessen the impact on our quality of life and mitigate the substantial environmental damage to these sensitive habitat areas over the multi-year construction timeline.
  • The original VPP (Venice Pumping Plant) was built in the late 1950’s when the Marina Peninsula was primarily comprised of oil derricks and marshland. 
  • During this time, Venice was considered the “slum by the sea,” which may in part explain why the original Venice Pumping Plant was located on the shores of the Grand Canal and adjacent to Ballona Lagoon.
  • As far back as the 1930s, this area was considered of poor quality and the area around the VAPP was redlined as a “Grade D.” It is likely the legacy of these attitudes that lead this neighborhood to host the pumping plant for sewage from the much of the westside of Los Angeles.
  • The first residential properties on and around Hurricane St were constructed in the mid-1960’s so design and other impactful attributes of the VPP were not material considerations.

The Planning Commission Staff Report: The report has now been released. It is 1,547 pages (scary) which covers almost every historical document related to this project including community submissions. The most important takeaway is the report does not include any impactful Conditions of Approval (Pages 15-18). This makes your active participation at the hearing even more important. Read the report here.

Issue: Methane Gas & Other Hazardous Conditions

The VAPP Mitigation Plan acknowledges “a significant hazard to the public or the environment through reasonably foreseeable upset and accident conditions involving the release of hazardous chemicals into the environment.” This includes encroachment or seepage of methane and other chemicals into the environment whose impact is considered potentially significant. We request:

  • Detection Devices: Installation of community scale detection devices throughout the community, in locations and quantities approved by the Director of Planning in consultation with Council District 11, to provide ongoing accurate measurements of methane and other related hazards. Monitoring results should be accessible to the public with updates no less frequent than every one hour via a public web-based dashboard or equivalent public-facing reporting. To date, LASAN has only agreed to occasional soil vapor testing, which is insufficient.
  • Community Protections: Proactively address the same exposure concerns for the community as defined for workers in the Mitigation Plan including response thresholds, protective actions, and communications protocols.
  • Immediate Work Suspension Trigger. Should an analysis identify a significant hazard to the public or environment, the entire Project must be suspended immediately until a realistic, enforceable mitigation plan, verified by an independent qualified professional, is put in place to address both short and long-term impacts.
  • Monthly Reporting: The project contractor must be required to provide a monthly Mitigation Monitoring Report to the community with copies to the Department of City Planning, Council District 11, and the Venice Neighborhood Council.
  • Residential Noise Thresholds: The Project shall comply, during construction and operation, with all applicable residential noise limits including the provision of sound barriers and operational controls necessary to meet applicable municipal code requirements and CEQA thresholds. The City should provide independent (3rd party) noise and air quality monitoring whose results shall be available to the community in real time.

Issue: Parking on Hurricane St

The Project requires that no parking will be allowed on Hurricane St during construction hours. This will displace 20-25 cars that park on the street daily. Further, after construction, the City proposes using 128 Hurricane for employee parking and a public parking lot even though it has recently created two on-site parking spots within the VAPP footprint AND there is no community support for a public parking lot. LASAN has never offered any viable solution to mitigate this loss of street parking. We request:

  • No Net Loss of Parking: Implement a parking mitigation plan, at no cost to residents, that provides equivalent replacement parking (20-25 spaces) within a reasonable walking distance (e.g., ¼ mile), to fully mitigate the loss of parking during construction hours on Hurricane St. for the duration of construction.
  • Reduce/Remove Weekly No-Parking Restrictions: The City shall convert existing weekly street-sweeping restrictions on the full length of Galleon, Hurricane and Ironside Streets to bi-weekly or less frequently.
  • Restore Removed Parking on Hurricane St: Restore the three parking spaces on the north side of Hurricane Street, east of Pacific Avenue, that were removed without community input.
  • 128 Hurricane Construction Use Only: The proposed parking lot site should be used solely as a staging location during construction. The City has made changes to the Project such that the proposed parking is no longer required for employee parking and would only be used for public use. The City can now remove the lot from the Project. As such, there is no need to approve the re-zoning of this parcel.
  • 128 Hurricane Mandatory Sale: At the completion of construction, the lot, purchased by the City for approximately $2.7 million, should be sold and not be retained or converted into a permanent public parking lot. The sale proceeds should be directed to fund community benefits related to this project and other community needs as directed by Council District 11, and/or deposited to support the City’s General Fund to address other badly needed fiscal priorities.
  • Future VAPP Parking Needs: If additional employee parking is needed in the future, the City should first implement the community-proposed red-zone parking solution located around the VPP and VAPP structures.

Issue: “Significant & Unavoidable” Residential Property Protections

The VAPP Mitigation Plan acknowledges “significant and unavoidable impact to surrounding land uses including ground-borne vibration levels that are distinctly perceptible at a receiving residential use or could potentially result in building damage. Section MM-NOI-2 of the mitigation plans does not adequately protect residential property from potential damage. Construction GEO-1 of the Mitigation Plan states the Project will “Expose people or structures to potential substantial adverse effects, including the risk of loss, injury, or death involving strong seismic ground shaking and/or seismically related ground failure, including liquefaction.” The plan to address residential impact uses terms such as “may include,” “if considered appropriate,” and “as feasible and practical.” The discretion is left entirely to a Project assigned engineer. The city has strong motivation to look past issues that may arise as a path to completing the project faster, especially with the Olympics on the horizon. We request:

  • Independent Baseline and Ongoing Property Inspections: Prior to construction, LASAN should retain an independent inspector, reasonably acceptable to the community and funded by LASAN, to document baseline conditions of all properties within 500 feet of the project. Follow-up inspections must occur at least semi-annually and additionally upon reasonable resident request for the duration of construction.
  • Enforceable Repair and Cure Obligations. The City should implement an enforceable plan to repair and cure defects and damage caused by the Project to properties located within 500 feet. In order to prevent continued damage while root causes are evaluated and corrected, investigation must commence within five business days and repairs shall be completed within thirty days, unless extended for good cause.
  • Mitigation Fund Disbursement Process: The community has been informed of the potential formation of a mitigation fund to cure such obligations. However, no details of the process, resource allocation, nor timeline have been communicated. Prior to the commencement of construction, the City should establish a mitigation fund with written eligibility criteria, a claim form, decision timelines, and an appeal process. It should be funded at a level sufficient to address reasonably foreseeable claims.
  • On-Site Authority to Halt Work: The City should assign a dedicated on-site representative who has the authority to require immediate corrective actions and, when necessary, shut down construction activities pending resolution of vibration, settlement, structural damage risks, hazardous conditions, or other violations.
  • Design Compatibility / Hazard Minimization Adjacent to Residential Property: Final design and operational plans should include measures to ensure the facility’s scale, design, and industrial characteristics are compatible with adjacent residential uses and minimize hazards reasonably foreseeable from ongoing industrial operations (including but not limited to transformer events, fumes, methane concerns, sewage overflow risk, tsunamis and earthquakes).
  • Temporary Property Tax Relief: The City should make good faith efforts to with the County Assessor to facilitate temporary reduced assessed valuations/property tax relief during the construction period for properties within 500 feet, in recognition of the acknowledged severity of construction impacts.

Issue: ESHA Compliance

The Project violates the court-ordered ESHA protections as well as the associated settlement agreement with the City to protect the Ballona Lagoon and Grand Canal. The current VAPP mitigation plans are insufficient to meet the protection requirements. The community strongly supports resolution of this issue. We request:

  • LASAN continue to work with CD-11 and the community and LASAN to obtain grants and/or other funding to implement the Grand Canal Ballona Lagoon Restoration Phase 2 project. This is a project that was court-ordered as part of a lawsuit settlement during Bill Rosenthal’s CD-11 administration. Phase 1 was implemented, and Phase 2 has already been designed and is on the Bureau of Engineering website.

Additional Issues

CD-11 has been participating and is committed to continue working with the City and the community to assure the following project issues are addressed in the Project RFP (Request For Proposal) and on an ongoing basis:

  • Air Purifiers for Impacted Households
  • Daily Dust Barriers & Removal to Restore Evening Street Parking
  • Emergency Preparedness Plan Requirements
  • Driftwood Bridge Commitment (Ingress/Egress and Emergency Preparedness)
  • Limitations on Construction Days/Hours
  • Heavy Equipment Prohibitions on Saturdays
  • Haul Truck Neighborhood Access Hours
  • Guaranteed Local Off-Site Workspace Program (500-foot Radius)
  • Recorded, Enforceable Conditions with Meaningful Penalties
  • Active Project Monitoring and Enforcement
  • Project Area Security Cameras with 24/7 Monitoring
  • Required Ongoing Maintenance Plan for both the VPP and VAPP
  • Project Duration and Schedule Updates/Transparency

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