Negotiations between Renaissance Academy and Greg Schem, landlord of the 881 Alma Real building, came to a halt this week when the school’s board authorized the filing of a civil lawsuit against Village Real Estate, LLC, the building’s owner. Schem told the Palisadian-Post Wednesday morning that he had not yet received a copy of the lawsuit filed by the new charter high school, which has an enrollment of more than 300 students in grades 9-12. In a six-hour board meeting November 10, Renaissance Academy board members decided that no further ‘good-faith settlement proposals’ on their part could be made to resolve the ongoing landlord-tenant dispute, which began during the first week of classes in September when Schem, in a surprise move, terminated the school’s lease effective June 16, 2005. ‘Although we very much wanted to avoid filing suit, and would still prefer to resolve the dispute through negotiation, we feel we have a very strong case, and are therefore confident we will receive a good outcome in the courts,’ the RA board wrote in a press release posted on the school’s Web site (www.rahigh.org). Bill Bryan, president of the RA board and a school parent, told the Post Tuesday: ‘We’ve done all the begging that there is to do. The lawsuit speaks for itself.’ The board’s decision to file a lawsuit came after it received a settlement proposal from Schem in late October. ‘We proposed a compromise on how we’d work together with [the school] and the City [of Los Angeles] to up the number of students on the terrace level to 150,’ Schem said Tuesday. To date, the L.A. Department of Building and Safety has officially restricted the ground level for administration and counseling, and stipulated that only 90 students occupy the four permitted classrooms on the lower terrace level. According to Bryan, Schem’s proposal ‘didn’t really invite a counter. In order to agree to the proposal, we’d have to agree to using less space than we are now.’ Since receiving clearance from the L.A. Fire Department in October, Renaissance has been allowing 150 students to attend classes on the terrace level. Those students have been using seven of the eight classrooms on that level. Independent study groups of about 10 students have been using the ground level. Other RA students have been attending classes at alternate Palisades locations, including the YMCA board room, a private home, Aldersgate Retreat Center on Haverford (which is owned by the United Methodist Church) and, occasionally, at Mort’s Oak Room. The press release announcing the lawsuit this week stated ‘that the strains of running a high school at multiple locations’in particular the extra challenges faced by our wonderful teachers, and the substantial extra rental costs’have become more than we can bear.’ ‘We feel we’ve been denied the fair use of the space we’ve rented,’ Bryan reiterated to the Post. ‘The necessity [for filing a lawsuit] is to attempt to get more use of the space through June.’ In addition to obtaining instructional use of the ground-level space, Renaissance wants approval to complete renovations in a second chunk of space on the terrace level, about 1,000 square feet in suite T-9, where construction was halted in its initial stages when black mold was discovered. ‘We began submitting plans to finish the space and [the landlord] has refused them,’ Bryan said. ‘T-9 is an unusable shell at the moment, but it could be [finished] easily in a week.’ Renaissance also needs the landlord’s approval to complete installation of the life safety upgrades, which would allow for more students to occupy the school’s space. ‘We have still not received approval,’ Bryan said. According to Schem, ‘The school continues to violate numerous Building and Safety codes and we’re puzzled as to why no enforcement action has taken place.’ While Schem said Wednesday morning that he had not seen the aforementioned lawsuit, he confirmed that he had not filed a suit against Renaissance, though he did not dismiss the option. ‘We can take [RA] to court and we’ll undoubtedly win,’ he said. Meanwhile, the Pacific Palisades Community Council subcommittee formed during the council’s September 23 meeting to address concerns regarding Renaissance, is ‘dormant,’ according to council vice-chairman Kurt Toppel. The committee met three times, but didn’t reach any specific recommendations. ‘It’s not the Community Council’s job to do what the school should do,’ Toppel said Tuesday. Bryan said, ‘The subcommittee proved to be an unwieldy forum for addressing the issues, and we decided one-on-one discussion between the council and the school would be more productive.’
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