Laguna Beach City Council on Monday upheld the design review board’s conditional approval for landscape modifications at 1813 Temple Hills Drive but tightened the conditions to address neighbors’ concerns about view loss and enforcement.

In a unanimous vote, the council sustained the DRB decision and added conditions that set a minimum height of 20 feet, a maximum trimming/height buffer that the council quantified as not to exceed 22.5 feet after pruning, require the property owner to trim the plants at least twice per year and to install discrete permanent markers (described in the record as narrow copper stakes) at the measured height to aid enforcement.

The matter began as an appeal filed by neighbors at 1843 Temple Hills Drive who said vegetation planted after a 2013 remodel—particularly several ficus trees—had grown into a protected view corridor and created both safety and privacy problems. Appellant Dr. Rhett Shiffman said the board and staff had omitted key landscape-consultant comments and that code enforcement history and earlier approvals were mishandled; he told council, “This was obviously intentional and spiteful,” as he described the condition of the vegetation before the DRB review.

City planning staff, represented in the hearing by Shritha Sharma, told council that modifications to a previously approved landscape plan are allowed under the municipal code and that the DRB had considered view‑equity and privacy, then conditionally approved the plan with a collar of protections (staff noted the DRB capped the ficus at 25 feet but included trimming and buffer measures). Staff recommended that the council deny the appeal and sustain the DRB vote. The DRB vote on the plan had been 5–0.

Neighbors and appellant counsel urged the council to vacate the approval and send the matter back for a hedge‑height procedure, or to require a lower maximum. The property owner, Kavita Reddy, and her counsel argued the DRB had appropriately balanced privacy and view equity and that the conditions already required trimmings and monitoring. The council compromised by imposing a narrower measurable range, an explicit twice‑per‑year trimming schedule, and permanent markers so that future compliance can be verified without repeated code‑enforcement site visits.

The council’s action is procedural and corrective rather than punitive: it keeps the DRB approval in place but adjusts measurable conditions to reduce the plaintiffs’ repeated enforcement requests while preserving the privacy protections the DRB found necessary. The city clerk recorded the vote as unanimous. Staff will incorporate the new conditions into the adopted resolution and update the plan approval documents.