For nearly 25 years, a treehouse stood in a Sherman Oaks neighborhood. It was built by an ex-producer of “The Simpson’s.” The treehouse was a beloved attraction for family and neighbors that was affectionately dubbed Boney Island during Halloween. For years, the city of LA fought to tear it down. The man behind the treehouse, Rick Polizzi, shared how it feels to demolish it.

Polizzi started creating the Boney Island Halloween display in 1997. The event attracted hundreds of visitors each year. He and fellow “Simpsons” producer Michael Mahan added the treehouse to the display a few years later. 

“We just kept adding walls here and there until it became a nice little structure. I’m from New Orleans and pretty sociable down there, and I feel in Los Angeles, [people] keep to themselves. And so I was always trying to do something to get the neighbors to come out and hang out, come over. That’s why I did the Halloween display,” Polizzi explained. “We were a victim of our own success because it got so crowded we had to hire traffic control. One neighbor across the street always hated it, and constantly calling the police and complaining, and then called the city on the tree house.”

In 2017, Polizzi’s neighbor told the city that he was running a business in the treehouse. When the city inspected it, they inquired about Polizzi’s permit. He didn’t have one, and a long legal saga began. 

“Once it gets in that City Hall system, I run into the red tape, the bureaucracy. And it was just seven years of banging your head against the wall and nothing ever happened. We got the zoning, but we don’t have the building permits, and they are calling it an ADU. And I’m saying it’s not an ADU. It’s under 120 square feet. And they just are saying, no, you’re going to need geological samples. You’re going to have to have surveys, architectural drawings, structural engineering drawings,” Polizzi said. 

All of those things would have cost Polizzi tens of thousands of dollars, on top of lawyer and court fees. He decided it was time for the treehouse to come down. Polizzi explained that “the city wins” on this issue.

“This wasn’t really hurting anyone. It had been up for 24 years. Never an incident. It just seems like you’d be able to soften the permitting for something like this. But I just never could get guidance from building and safety. And it was more legal fees, and we’re taking it to court. And the average citizen just has to give up,” he said. 

Polizzi says he does not have any plans to rebuild the treehouse at this time.

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