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Real Estate

Irv's Burgers Owner Claims Pressure by New Neighbors

The property owner denies any threat to the longstanding burger stand that is a designated Weho cultural resource.

The owner of a West Hollywood hamburger stand that the city has designated a local cultural resource claimed she has been pressured to relocate in order to make way for a new restaurant.

Sonia Hong, owner of 62-year-old Irv's Burgers, said associates of her new commercial neighbors went to the sidewalk eatery in late December bearing warnings of a rent increase, termination of her month-to-month lease and offers of leads to new places where she could relocate Irv's. Hong said she didn't know the full names of the individuals who approached her.

"There's two units in this one lot," Hong said. "This guy who's putting a coffee shop is trying to kick me out of this place, and he's trying to put his own mini-Johnny Rockets. ... I want to stay here and work it out instead of getting kicked out. "

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Hong and her family, who are originally from Korea, have owned Irv's since 2000 when they invested their life savings and purchased the business for $100,000.

"For years there have been different owners telling me to wait for a [long-term] lease because they're going to fix the property up," Hong said. "It's not fair."

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The latest round of attempts to upgrade the property at 8289-8293 Santa Monica Blvd. began in January 2011 when the West Hollywood Historic Preservation Commission approved plans for a beach-themed cafe next to Irv's in addition to improvements to the burger stand.

Los Angeles-based property owner Steven Bohbot said he intends to keep the Hongs as tenants and incorporate Irv's into the property's redevelopment plan.

"Our whole concept is assimilating Irv's old school with this new design, we're even doing improvements to Irv's," Bohbot said.

"I don't know why she's so worried ... I definitely would not want them to leave," he added.

Bohbot said Michael Berman, a principal in Schoos Design which designed the proposed restaurant, is a partner in the cafe business. The landowner couldn't identify any other cafe partners.

Schoos Design spokesman Matthew Hutchison declined to comment on the project until plans are more finalized and wouldn't identify Berman's partners in the cafe business.

The West Hollywood Community Development Department couldn't identify the cafe entrepreneurs.

"The city does not have that information yet," Senior Planner Francisco Contreras said in an email to Patch. "Typically we will find out when that business comes in to apply for a business license."

Mayor Jeffrey Prang sent a letter to Bohbot dated Dec. 20 that praised the Hong family and urged for Irv's preservation at its current historic Route 66 location.

"The Hongs are a special family," Prang wrote. "Few business people become as important to the social fabric of a community as the business, but the Hongs have achieved that treasured status. It is my fervent hope and my urgent request that you do everything possible to preserve Irv's as an historic community institution, and allow the Hongs to continue to operate their hard earned family business."

Currently the city’s Building and Safety Division is considering a building permits application for the cafe, Contreras said.

Irv's faced demolition in 2004 when then-property owner Gregg Seltzer of Santa Monica filed an application to demolish the burger stand to accommodate a Peet's coffee shop.

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