This is Malibu’s Only Local Daily News … the Monday edition … I’m Hans Laetz reporting. 

Support for KBUU Radio comes from Rancho del Cielo.   For 8 years … Rancho del Cielo has been a partner to bringing public radio to the Malibu.

Rockslide Cleared From Decker Cyn Rd

Decker Canyon Road is back open today … 

A big rockslide north of Pacific Coast Highway closed the old back road to Thousand Oaks to northbound traffic heading up the hill.

Southbound traffic was open … most of the time … yesterday … while Caltrans crews cleaned up the debris.

Encinal Canyon Road … just to the east … is a handy detour …. and frankly the better route up the hill anyway.

The northbound roadway reopened late yesterday … according to Caltrans.

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Support for KBUU Radio comes from the Malibu Brewing Company.

Malibu Brewing Company is a locally owned craft brewery, proudly supporting our community, and local public radio. 

The tap room at Trancas Country Market is open…

And the Malibu Brewing Company is serving its Oktoberfest festbier … a traditional lager with notes of toffee … moderate malt flavors and delicate hops.

A chef prepared menu to enjoy on the patio or inside.

Malibu Brewing Company Malibu California

President On Westside Today and Tonight

President Joseph Biden will be on the westside today … and hsio motorcade routes and security closures are not publicized.

Biden is scheduled to give a public address about  nfrastructure spending at a Metro station in Brentwood.

We think that will be at about 10 this morning … and we think it will be at the western end of the Wilshire subway … now under construction on the western side of the 405 at Wilshire Boulevard.

Later tonight … Biden motorcades will be moving about in the Brentwood area again.

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Support for Radio Malibu KBUU comes from the Mark and Grether Real Estate Group.

Combining the talents of Tony Mark and Russell Grether…

The Mark and Grether Group offers concierge-level service… personalized attention… to buyers and sellers… landlords and tenants … here in Malibu.

The Mark and Grether Group… a top producing team with 35 years of experience… and over $1 billion worth of real estate sold in least… from Malibu’s coastline to the canyons.

SCE Still Working To Come Up With Power Outage Explanation

Southern California Edison  crews are still trying to come up with a reason for yesterday’s power outage on Point Dume and Paradise Cove.

It appears that the trouble-plagued Cuthbert Circuit blacked out yesterday afternoon … taking roughly 24-hundred customer accounts into blackout conditions.

Edison is not ready to say what went wrong.

But the outage happened just after a small rain shower had doused the area with a small amount of water.

And Edison has had real problems keeping that circuit working every autumn.

In past years … SCE officials have said that fog-related explosions and fires were caused by dirt and grime, which accumulates on insulators and other components. 

When the grime gets wet  … electricity flows into the ground, causing wooden elements to heat and eventually burn.

In 2017 … a heavy October fog caused 14 separate short circuits and power outages. 

The Cuthbert Circuit gets power outages on the order of 7 times worse than the system-wide average.

Cuthbert blacked out for 3,656 minutes of blackouts last year – that’s more than 60 hours of cumulative no service.

SCE says 33 percent of the outages last year on Cuthbert were weather related.

But there was no unusual weather in 2021… just coastal fog and occasional rain.

We’ve asked Edison for more information …. we will keep you posted. 

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Mad Interior Art dot com … from Milan to Malibu … supporters of Radio Malibu. … KBUU.

Uhring Opposes Malibu Film Society Using Malibu Canyon Church, Wants The Films Inside City Hall

Malibu city council member Steve Uhring really doesn’t want the Malibu Film Society to show movies in a church near his house. 

Angry words were exchanged yesterday at Malibu City Hall … when a zoning subcommittee that Uhring and Mikke Pierson sit on met over the computers.

The issue was how art shows … the farmers Market and other civic events are not really addressed in the city’s Temporary Use Permit process.

The Malibu Film Society really sticks in Uhring’s craw.

Film Society director Scott Tallal is striving to return first run … pre-release movies to Malibu.

The city planning department has ruled that the Malibu Pacific Church on Malibu Canyon Road is not allowed to do that under its current use permit

Councilman Steve Uhring lives right near that church .,.. and he doesn’t want too allow movies to be shown there.

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“The city has offered Scott the ability to use Malibu City Hall to run his movies. Now all I’ve heard is ton of … you know … stuff all over the place.”

Uhring says having people watch movies in the church is too dangerous … traffic … and it sits in a brushfire corridor.

He wants the film society to show movies at City Hall instead.

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UHRING: “Let’s take a look what we’ve got at City Hall. See if we can modify some of that place and give you a place to run your movies where there is no problem,

TALLAL: ““Steve, if I could take advantage of that offer I would be an idiot not to.”

UHRING: “Absolutely.”

TALLAL: “The studios will not allow show a movie unless we can have surroundsound and there is no way to overcome the Surround Sound impossibility in that splace.”

UHRING: “How come there is a Malibu Film Festival or something that is showing movies in City Hall.

TALLAL: “They are not getting first run movies from the studios and they never have.”

The executive director of the Film Society … Scott Tallal… says the City Hall chambers is not set up for movies … bad sound … really bad architecture.

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““We hired a professional movie theater consultant … who said that the place had sight line problems because a good portion of the seating was placed at viewing angles that were up to twice the acceptable industry limit … as established by two organizations.

“One is SMPTE … the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers … the other is THX (the studio audio specialist company).

“All overall seating area is so widely dispersed as to rule out any possibility of installing Surround Sound.”

Steve Uhring didn’t believe that.

He said he wants to see written proof from Scott Tallal. 

Tallal says the written preposition reports were in his desk .. which burned when his house burned down in the Woolsey Fire. 

The city councilman says supposed fire danger alone rules out the use of the church on Malibu Canyon Road to show movies.

And Uhring “told off” councilman Mikke Pierson on that issue.

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“Our job is to protect the community. Period.

“We should be doing nothing that places the community residents at risk.

“And doing this places them at risk and you seem to be OK with that. 

“I disagree with that.”

Pierson … incredulous … asked Uhring if he wanted church services banned in the church as well.

Tallal countered that the Film Society always monitors the fire situation … and in fact stopped its movie projector when it appeared the Woolsey Fire was going to jump the 101 back in 2018.

And he argued that churches by their nature are community centers … hosting all sorts of boy scout troops or AA meetings or other events … without TUPs.

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TALLAL:  “it’s not just movies.

“It’s the free community events like the Super Bowl and the NBA championships and the World Series.

“So it’;s a community resource… and the churches are simply trying to make this stuff available as part of their community outreach …. And we just want to help them do that.

CITY COUNCIL MEMBER MIKE PIERSON: “And I’m aware that City is a huge outlier that you can’t use a church for a community event … that it needs a TUP.”

That was city council member Mikke Pierson at the end … pointing out that other cities allow churches to hold meeting for movies or whatever without having to pull a permit for every single one.

The two members of the zoning subcommittee will both present their arguments to the full city council … possibly as elections are underway and before the new city council comes in.

And … speaking of the elections …all of this needs to be seen in the context of the election.

Scott Tallal’s wife … Jimy Tallal… is one of six candidates running for city council in the current election.

Uhring is supporting other candidates,

We also need to point out this editor’s note.

Scott Tallal is a community volunteer at KBUU and he sits on our Board of Directors.

KBUU points out this obvious conflict of interest… and the inherent obligation to report both the conflict and the issue fairly and accurately.

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SMC Board Answers Malibu City Council 5-0 Vote Against Their Bond Issue

As you probably know … we’ve been reporting on at the Santa Monica College asking you to vote yes on their bond issue … Measure SMC … on the fall ballot. 

Measure SMC is a $375 million construction bond for the colleges’s Santa Monica campus … with almost all of it designated for use in Santa Monica … but nearly one third of the tax revenue dooming from Malibu.

The college board chair … Dr. Louise Jaffe .. is answering the unanimous Malibu opposition. 

She says in a written statement that this bond issue would help build new media studies facilities at Malibu high school using 20 million dollars in Measure SMC funds.

And intentionally or not … she picks a fight with Malibu over declining enrollment at the local schools …  

She said passing the bond … which includes a 20 million contribution to a performing arts center at Malibu High … will “help stabilize the program and recruit new families to the high school.

Jaffe woke that Malibu High School has had one of the largest drops in enrollment in California ….from 1100 students 8 years ago to 412 students this year.

“We know that Malibu High School has suffered one of the largest drops in enrollment in California over the past eight years, from 1,107 students in 2015 to 412 students in 2022,” Jaffe said in the written statement. “SMC is committed to helping build new media studies facilities at Malibu High School using Measure SMC funds. We do so in hopes of helping to both stabilize the program and to recruit new families to the high school.”

Jaffe got her numbers wrong.

The SMC official apparently does not know that a Middle School has bene carved out of the high school …  

The current enrollment at the combined middle school and high school is not just over 400 … it is just under 700.

Jaffe also wrote that “Santa Monica College invested over $80 million in facilities and support to bring the community college promise of affordable and quality higher education to the Malibu community.”

That money was more than offset by Malibu taxes sent to the Santa Monica College bind funds of years past.

One other note … 

The official ballot opposition to the measure does not have any Malibu residents on it … but that is because the City of Santa Monica is in charge of this election matter …. And they did zero outreach to Malibu before the ballot measure was prepared.

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Support for KBUU radio comes from Saguaro Technology.

Based in Malibu … Saguaro Technology offers software development and other engineering services across the entire product life cycle… and across several industries.

Life sciences, automation, robotics.

Saguaro Technology engineers work side-by-side with the client to extend engineering teams… to create and launch products faster… and more cost effectively.

Saguaro Technology can be reached at saguarotech.net

Santa Monica Planning Failure Opens Door To Nearly 5,000 New Units In Multistory Buildings

Speaking of Santa Monica failures .. a failure by the Santa Monica city council to come up with a housing plan means that developers can bypass most any zoning rules … and get their projects rubber stamped.

And developers have taken advantage of an Oklahoma-style land rush …. and submitted requests for nearly 5,000 new housing units.

One of those is a 15-story residential building just off the Santa Monica freeway at Centinella Avenue.

Seven multistory apartment buildings or condos are now automatically approved in the downtown area … 

They are all 9 or 10 stories high … that’s more than 16 hundred new housing units between the beach and Lincoln Avenue.

Other big condo or apartment projects …. 11 or 12 stories high … will get an automatic green light on Santa Monica Boulevard and Broadway near the city’s eastern end.

The Santa Monica Daily Press reports that the news was delivered to the city council Tuesday.

Under state law… Santa Monica has to approve zoning for housing units based on the number of jobs in the city… And massive office building in the last decade meant that the city had to come up with a housing element in a general plan that would be accepted by the state.

They failed to do that … and that means any project that includes some housing held as affordable is entitled to a rubber stamp approval.

If two people live in each unit … the 12 rubber-stamped projects will increase Santa Monica’s population by about 15 percent.

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Cher Again Trying To Sell Landmark Palace

And back in Malibu … Cher is once again trying to sell her landmark house on PCH at Puerto Canyon.

The recording star slash TV star slash movie star slash pop icon is asking 85 million dollars for the Italianate palace …

The Wall Street Journal reports the palace has 40 palm trees … a primary suite with a meditation room and adjoining wig room … and a home theater.

Cher built the house after filing the very first lawsuit against the then brand-new Malibu city government  in 1992.

After that was settled .. she built privacy walls that were too high and added an illegal tennis court.

That was settled through some sort of donation to a local school.

In 2014 … Cher reportedly sold the mansion to Beyonce for 45 million dollars.

That deal was never completed. 

Now … it’s back on the market for an asking price of 85 million.

Maybe Beyonce is still interested.

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Support for KBUU Radio comes from the Malibu Foundation.

The Malibu Foundation underwrote the KBUU solar panels and batteries at the transmitter … which keeps KBUU’s FM transmitting on 99.1 during storms and blackouts… 24 seven… on clean renewable Malibu sunshine.

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You can hear the news live every morning until 9:30 on KBUU.

FM 99.1 in western Malibu.  Also: streaming at www.radiomalibu.net

Between 10 and 2 … you can hear the newscast playback loop on KBU2. That’s on FM 99.1 HD2 in your car, or streaming at s7.viastreaming.net/6500

If humanly possible, the KBUU NewsScript is usually published at around midday at www.radiomalibu.net