Hi Everyone it’s Paul.

Please allow me to express my heartfelt thanks to all of the people who have been writing letters to try and keep the Woodshed alive. As long as I have your support there is hope.

The following is my attempt to explain and clarify some of the points raised in our Council Member Wendy Greuel’s reply letter that many of you received. A lot of you have become concerned as a result of her letter that I have been deliberately negligent in my duties to fulfill my variance and permit obligations. I can assure you, that is not the case.

Very few causes are lucky enough to have the support of a council person. I am proud and privileged to have had Ms. Greuel’s pro-active guidance and leadership in the past. She is a wonderful Council Person that is extremely well respected. She continues to do a lot of great things in her community and has made a major positive impact on the City of LA. Click here http://www.lacity.org/council/cd2/cd2_bio.htm to see Ms. Greuel’s biography. 

I would like to address the last paragraph in Ms. Greuel’s letter where she states: “to date, he has not submitted the applications needed to deal with his parking problem” The Department of City Planning will not alow me to submit my new applications because I lost the use of the parking lot on the corner of Laurel Canyon and Weddington due to Peyton’s meddling with the lot owner. In the Woodshed variance the Zoning Administration clearly states that if I failed to meet any of the required conditions (the off site parking lot being one of them) that the entire variance would be “null and void.”

That lot was the only parking lot within the Zoning Administrations maximum 500 foot radius of the Woodshed that I was able to get which had the minimum 19 spaces required by the Zoning Administration. The Department of City Planning has told me that I can not re-apply for a new variance application until I can secure permission to use another lot that is large enough to satisfy the Zoning Administrations requirements. The Jon’s Market and the Bank of America parking lots are the only other two that are large enough but they have denied my repeated request to lease them as well as some very well respected people in the community

The Woodshed has a Maximum Seating Capacity of 49 according to orders from the Fire Marshall. The Zoning Administration should simply dismiss the parking requirements because there is room for over 100 cars on Laurel Canyon alone from Magnolia to Chandler, and much more if you include adjoining side streets. 95% of all the businesses are closed when we operate in the evening,  We don’t cause parking problems so we should not be required to lease an off site parking lot. Even if I did get the ok to use a different parking lot who’s to say that Peyton wouldn’t sabotage our agreement with them as well.

In Ms. Greuel’s letter she also says: “Based on the City Attorney’s requirements, the necessary work must be done and the necessary approvals must be obtained as soon as possible.” According to the Department of Building and Safety, the necessary inspection and approval process can never move forward until I resolve the parking issue. The only work that the Zoning Administration has requested that has not been completed yet is for me to build heavy duty six inch thick sound insulation walls on all sides of the Woodshed that would meet their requirements to attain a Sound Transmission Class (STC) of 58. I was prepared to raise the money and build the walls in the spring of 2006 but because we lost the use of the parking lot I needed to wait. I did not want to take a chance by raising thousands of dollars in donations to build the walls if the Woodshed was later shut down because we couldn’t satisfy the Zoning Administrations variance requirements for the parking lot.

I am sad and disappointed that Ms. Greuel chose to distance herself from the Woodshed many months ago. If she had continued to work closely with me I wouldn’t have had to ask you all to send her letters urging her to re-start her support. Ms. Greuel’s Planning Director Dale Thrush was always the person I worked with directly but he stopped returning my phone calls last summer. The only time I was successful at speaking with Mr. Thrush was when I finally went uninvited in October of 2006, to Ms. Greuel’s downtown office in City Hall and waited for him in the reception area.

In defense of Ms. Greuel and Mr. Thrush I would like to explain why they have understandably tried to distance themselves from the Woodshed. Once again it all comes back to my next door neighbor Charles Peyton aka Jeff Stryker the porn star guy. He created a website www.charlespeyton.com that viciously attacks me and Ms. Greuel. He accuses her of all sorts of terrible and outlandish things and this has become a political liability for Ms. Greuel.

I would like to offer my sinsere apologies to Ms. Greuel for being the reason Peyton began attacking her. I can understand and I respect Ms. Greuel’s decision to try and distance herself from the Woodshed but I don’t know what else I can do. Without her pro-active support in getting us through this crisis the Woodshed will soon be forced to close. It is my hope that Ms. Greuel will stand beside us in fighting back against this degrading thuggish neighborhood bully. Surely we can return the favor to her some day.

Please let me know if you need further explanation regarding your questions and concerns but remember, Ms. Greuel is our friend, we just need to continue to encourage her to do all that she can to help us. Thank you for joining me in this very difficult challenge. I am humbled and proud to be the creator and host of such a vibrant, creative, and loving community.

Peace