A beloved and inexpensive public golf and tennis membership in Studio City will quickly be demolished for a brand new sports activities facility for an elite non-public college. 

“I’m glad I got to be here before the demolition starts,” mentioned golfer Debra Evans. 

For 25 years, Evans has golfed on the nine-hole course at Weddington Golf and Tennis Club. However, her inexpensive par three will quickly belong to Harvard-Westlake and its college students after the Los Angeles City Council unanimously permitted its plan to show the general public inexperienced area into a large sports activities facility. 

“It’s an industrial lot-sized ‘sportszilla.’ It’s huge!” neighborhood member Teri Austin mentioned.

Austin and the nonprofit Save Weddington bitterly fought the Harvard-Westlake mission, claiming that the town prioritized the rich households whose children attend the $47,000 per yr non-public college as an alternative of the hundred thousand Angelenos per yr who pay the $12 payment to putt across the course. 

Austin and her group nonetheless plan to struggle the event via the courtroom system. 

“It’s the city who did not follow their own rules, and, we believe, improperly granted a conditional use permit based on an environmental study that was inadequate and insufficient,” mentioned Austin. “We’re gonna prove it in court.”

Councilmember Nithya Raman, who represents the district, said she and her group are working to shift the mission into one thing that “serves both the community and the school.”

“I myself have a personal connection to it: my father plays tennis here there times a week,” Raman wrote in an announcement. 

She added that the town ensured the brand new web site will embrace 5.5 acres of public greenspace and partial use of among the facilities.