Liquor Compromise : Studio City Restaurant, Neighbors Make Peace

A compromise that could end months of wrangling over a liquor license for a posh new Studio City restaurant was toasted Friday by both sides in the dispute.

A city zoning administrator said he will authorize limited liquor sales as part of a conditional-use permit for the proposed Bistro Garden restaurant if its developer will take steps to protect the serenity of an adjoining neighborhood.

“We can live with that,” said Rose Elmassian, secretary of the Sherman Oaks Homeowners Assn. and leader of a campaign to limit the restaurant’s license.

“So can we,” said Herbert Piken, developer of the $15-million Center at Coldwater shopping center that will house the upscale restaurant.

William Lillenberg, a Los Angeles zoning officer, said he will allow drinks to be served until midnight at the new restaurant--provided Piken takes steps to prevent diners and restaurant employees from driving and parking on nearby residential streets and disturbing neighbors.

The city’s action will clear the way for the state Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control to act on a liquor-license application for the restaurant. State officials indicated in March that they were considering a similar midnight liquor sales cutoff.

Piken has long looked to the stylish restaurant as the tone-setting anchor tenant to the new shopping center being built at the Ventura Boulevard site of the former Tail O’ the Cock restaurant.

But Elmassian and other homeowners had protested the liquor-license applications on grounds that noisy and intoxicated patrons might disturb residents of an adjoining 50-year-old residential area.

“We’d love to have the Bistro there,” said homeowner Lillian Salin. “The only thing we’re against is the traffic.”

Midnight Cutoff

Salin and other protesters in a crowd of about 60 people at a Van Nuys hearing urged that the restaurant be required to stop serving drinks at 11 p.m.

Restaurant operator Kurt Niklas, owner of the renowned Bistro and Bistro Garden restaurants in Beverly Hills, told Lillenberg that an early cutoff was unrealistic, however.

“We can’t tell people to quit drinking at 11. We have to keep serving to midnight,” Niklas said. “We have to pay our rent and our wages.”

Support for the midnight license came from the Studio City Residents Assn. and the Studio City Chamber of Commerce.

‘Working Together’

“This is a perfect case of a developer and a restaurant working together with residents and the business community,” said Jerry Hayes, a chamber representative.

Pauline Amond, a shopping center representative, said that “a fine restaurant will have late diners. You come to the Bistro to eat. You’re not going to have people hanging around and slamming doors.”

Lillenberg said he will issue his formal conditional-use permit decision in about three weeks after he spells out conditions for on-site employee parking, lighting and landscaping and controls over noise and customer traffic.