John Walker Responds to Calls of ‘We Need You’ as Neighborhood Council President

When John Walker went around to introduce himself before the free movies held at Beeman Park over the last month, he was surprised how many people said, “Oh YOU are John Walker! Thanks for everything you are doing in the community.”

And then, when Studio City Patch wrote a few weeks ago that Walker had decided he would leave his position as the Studio City Neighborhood Council president, he was inundated with responses and phone calls.

“I was stunned by the response, I got over 200 emails, not just from people in Studio City but from all over,” Walker said during a lunch at Tula’s last week. “People said, ‘We need you’ and they named specific issues and concerns they still had about the community, and how much I’ve helped them.”

And so, Walker is rethinking leaving the position as president of the council where he has served for six years.

But, he does aspire to a higher office—and said he knows he can contribute more to the community.

How about Deputy Mayor?

“I think I would fill the spot of Deputy Mayor of the San Fernando Valley rather nicely,” Walker said. “But I don’t think I will get that.”

Just this past year alone, Walker joined together more than 70 officials of the 95 Neighborhood Councils at a joint meeting at Carla’s Café on the CBS Studios Radford Lot (also attended by Patch), and it was considered one of the most important and well-attended gatherings by the Department of Neighborhood Empowerment (DONE) which oversees the neighborhood councils.

Walker personally went to meetings at City Hall to fight to get Studio City put back into one district, rather than shared between three council members.

Walker also worked closely with Universal Studios and the city officials to downscale the Universal Evolution plan, which at one point attracted 370 locals to their council meeting (which Patch covered extensively).

Often Studio City Neighborhood Council is looked at by their activism, studied reactions to issues and community involvement, according to City Councilman Paul Krekorian, who has touted and honored Walker’s leadership.

But, Walker endorsed his Studio City fellow resident Wendy Greuel for Los Angeles Mayor, and she lost to Eric Garcetti. He thinks he may have dashed his hopes to be a Deputy Mayor. 

“Had I not had a relationship with Wendy, I would have wholly endorsed Eric,” Walker said. “I do think Wendy would have been a transformative mayor. I felt honor-bound to endorse her and while she was our council representative, she never let me down. Garcetti is certainly one of the smartest people to be our mayor in a long time, he’s a Rhodes Scholar after all. He is super intelligent and I admire the heck out of him.”

But, the new mayor’s office hasn’t returned Walker’s calls.

“In the past, I’ve been able to reach the mayor and get to the officials I need to get to, and I hope to be able to continue that relationship,” Walker said.

And, for six years, the 62-year-old film producer and production designer has led the neighborhood council as vice president and president and was able to get things done.

He wasn’t convinced that the Neighborhood Council system would work, at first.

“I still think the Neighborhood Council should have a vote,” Walker said. “I think if five or six councils feel strongly and vote for a certain idea or issue, then we should have a vote, rather than just be an advisory body to our council members.”

In his area of Studio City, the charming walking area of Colfax Meadows, he said, “We got 17 cut-outs on the curbs for people in wheelchairs, we did that! We got 16 stop signs throughout the different neighborhoods in Studio City. It’s because we have some great volunteers, but it’s also because I could pick up the phone and know the person at the other end and get something done.”

He can cut through the bureaucracy, too.

Although Walker and the council members are not paid positions, it’s been practically a fulltime job for him. He is often consulting with the Studio City Residents Association, the neighboring councils, the Studio City Chamber of Commerce and the Studio City Improvement Association on ways to help the community, or how they can pool their influence and people power to get something done. For example, getting new and usable parking meters along Ventura Boulevard instead of the ones that people had so many problems with recently.

But now, Walker is also expanding a new business venture with his oldest son, who went to Campbell Hall and is now in Atlanta running Your Rental Resource, http://yourrentalresource.com which helps people find places to live—and he hopes to launch it nationally.

Walker got a master’s degree in Political Science after going to the University of Maryland on a baseball scholarship. He grew up in a Republican family in Portland.

“My parents thought I would become the youngest mayor of Portland, Oregon—that was their aspiration for me,” Walker laughed.

He fell in love with a young actress, and he became an actor himself, and began producing and packaging plays for a few seasons in a theater company put together by actress Maureen Stapleton.

Then, he worked as an executive assistant for Senator Wayne Morse (D-Oregon). He got to meet Richard Nixon, and Walker’s personal politics leaned Democratic because he felt that humanitarian issues, and programs such as Food Stamps and student aid, were important.

“Then, I got a job at the lumber mill of Universal Studios, on the lower lot, and I was the first college-educated person working in the lumber yard at Universal Studios,” Walker said. “I developed an accounting system that was tabulated on a computer.”

That was in 1974, and he got to meet Universal bigwigs such as Dr. Jules Stein, Lew Wasserman and he befriended Steven Spielberg during the time that the young director was sneaking onto the lot to plant himself in any empty office. Walker got to work in the Black Tower, and worked his way into his profession.

“I worked my way into production because I was aggressive,” he said. “I nurtured the right relationships, met the right people and was given opportunities that everyone comes to Hollywood for.”

He helped Spielberg with his first TV series, “High Incident,” a cop show, and Walker tells funny stories of how the innovative director would call for 11 cameras and two cranes for a single scene on an intersection at DeSoto and Victory Boulevard and get away with it.

Walker attained some note in production design, even winning award from the Art Directors Guild for a TV movie called "The '70s."

Then, Walker worked on the most expensive TV pilot ever shot at the time, for $11.5 million, for “Return to Fantasy Island” and was scouting shoots for Barry Sonnenfield. It was during that time that Walker was living in the Studio City hills on Laurie Drive and he got a call that his house (and a half dozen others) were sliding down the hill. 

“That was a most horrible, horrible time,” Walker recalled.

He called for help from then-councilman Joel Wachs and ended up filing a joint lawsuit against the city in 1999 when they could show that leaking sewer pipes eroded the land under their houses. Walker lost everything.

Walker’s younger son Michael is developmentally disabled and Walker went back to school to get a clinical psychology doctorate.

“All this time, I was still interested in politics,” Walker said.

In fact, when Greuel became City Controller, Walker took out papers to run for the District 2 city council spot. After a three-hour meeting with Paul Krekorian, Walker determined that he would best represent the area, and withdrew from the race.

Walker also credits CBS Studio President Michael Klausman with encouraging him to stay in politics. One of the first neighborhood council presidents in Studio City, Klausman donates space and offices to the council, and allows the public to come to the studio backlot for community meetings.

“People don’t realize how much Michael Klausman does for the community,” Walker said. “For any project we get involved with, I can call him up and he says, ‘What do you need?’ and is there for us." 

Being part of the film industry creates some awkwardness for Walker, especially when people complain about an inordinate amount of filming going on in Colfax Meadows.

Speaking as a private citizen, Walker said it doesn’t bother him, and he doesn’t feel it’s excessive.

“People are allowed to complain, that is what our meetings are all about, but it doesn’t bother me,” Walker said. “And I also think you can’t chase everything away. We are Studio City, after all.”

The big issue now for the area is bike lanes coming through Studio City. Walker said he gets lots of emails against it, but the bike lobby is very strong. Another issue is a proposal by Harvard-Westlake School to add a bridge and a parking lot to their property along Coldwater Canyon Boulevard.

“I’m so pro-Studio City and love the community so much,” said Walker, who just took his two grandchildren,

Ileana, 4 and Luka 2, to a day at Universal Studios, where he is already seeing some of the new expansion going on, including a new restaurant that he loves.

“I’m looking forward to continuing to serve the community in whatever capacity,” Walker said. “It was flattering and humbling to get that community response after the Patch story, and it made me re-think my position because you often think no one is paying attention.”

Walker added, “I think I would be a good representative of the Valley and would be a good Deputy Mayor for the Valley. I don’t lose my head, I think I’m composed, I’m erudite, I’m verbal, I’m educated and I know so many people here.”

Meanwhile, he is looking for more people to get involved in the neighborhood councils, and he’s willing to continue to be a mentor, coach and cheerleader for the community activists.

The next Studio City Neighborhood Council meeting (with food provided by local restaurants) is this Wednesday at the CBS Radford Lot, 4024 Radford Ave., beginning at 6:30 p.m.

* Also see the two videos of Walker and the photos.