Pair of office buildings planned in Porter Ranch, site of 2015 gas leak

A 39,000-square-foot office development is planned in the north San Fernando Valley neighborhood of Porter Ranch, where a major gas leak forced thousands of people to leave their homes three years ago.

An entity based in Wyoming filed for the two-building complex at 11280 N. Wilbur Avenue on Thursday. The property sits at the corner of Rinaldi Street near Ronald Reagan Freeway, in a mixed residential and commercial area. The project will include 117 parking spaces.

The developer is Hovhov Holdings, Inc., which is connected to a Granada Hills individual named John Akhoian, the CEO of regional plumbing company Rooter Hero Plumbing, based in nearby Mission Hills. His entity bought the property from a Delaware entity for $1.9 million in late 2017.

Porter Ranch is an affluent neighborhood north of Northridge and east of Granada Hills on the northern edge of the San Fernando Valley. In 2015 it was heavily affected by the Aliso Canyon natural gas leak, the worst methane leak in American history. It forced thousands of people in the neighborhood out of their homes for months.

Toll Brothers has been building thousands of homes there over the last few years and claimed shortly after the leak was under control that the leak didn’t affect pricing. CEO Douglas C. Yearly Jr. said in April 2017 that the company was selling homes for record prices, including sales above $2 million.