No clear outcome from court hearing on UCLA Japanese Garden

This seems to be the season for uncertain outcomes of court proceedings, as our prior post notes.  The Beverly Hills Courier is reporting that a hearing on Aug. 28, apparently about continuing the current injunction barring the sale of the Hannah Carter Japanese Garden in Bel Air by UCLA, resulted in claims by opposing attorneys but no outcome.

Blog readers will know that the garden, once the property of a former Regent - Edward Carter - was given to UCLA which at a later point said it would maintain it in perpetuity.  An associated residence on the property was occupied by the widow of Regent Carter.  When she died, UCLA got permission from a court in Oakland to sell the property without a guarantee that the garden would be maintained.  If you use the search engine on this blog to search under "Japanese Garden," you will find the history of this case.  Apart from family members, there is an interest in conserving the garden by conservation groups and neighboring homeowners.

We have noted here that litigation is expensive and the outcomes are often not predictable.  UCLA has a habit of not dealing with groups that might be adversely affected by its projects - think Grand Hotel - and ending up in court.  Sometimes opposing groups actually have something to say that UCLA might benefit from hearing.  Imagine that!

To read the Courier article, you have to download the pdf of the Aug. 30 edition.  The article is on pages 1 and 18.  Go to http://bhcourier.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/083013Fissue.pdf.

As the article notes, the same Sam Morabito who came up with the Grand Hotel concept had his fingers in the Japanese Garden affair.