Neighbors object to size of house.

It was less than a year ago when PeopleSoft Inc. founder David Duffield's company was seized by larger rival Oracle in what many insiders called one of the ugliest takeovers in years.

Now, flush with cash from the stock buyout, Duffield plans to build a 72,000-square-foot house in Alamo, 30 miles east of San Francisco, that would surpass the size of the White House, William Randolph Hearst's castle or the home of Bill Gates.

But before he can begin construction, Duffield must contend with opposition by neighbors, who say the area would be adversely affected by the structure.

"This thing would loom over the other homes and change the character of what is a rural setting," said Michael Durkee, a San Francisco lawyer hired by a group of Bryan Ranch residents who oppose the project. "Just to construct it would involve 2 1/2-to-five years of constant construction trucks and workers."

Duffield's attorney, David A. Gold of Morrison & Foerster in Walnut Creek, plans to file a proposal this week with the neighborhood association's architectural review committee, which must give the nod of approval for construction to begin. Durkee filed similar paperwork with the committee last week.

Gold said his filing will focus on the "technical and architectural side" of the project.

"Once the [architectural review committee] sees the quality craftsmanship and design and that the style conforms with the immediate homes in the neighborhood, ... that will show that we are taking these things into consideration," he said.

"We want to abide by the desires of the association," Gold added, "but we address that 22 acres of parcel for construction are a lot to work on without disturbing the rest of the neighborhood. We certainly would abide by the terms of hours of construction."

Durkee's clients remain skeptical and have launched an intense campaign of distributing flyers and holding homeowner meetings.

"Last week, there were 100 people present," said Durkee, a partner at Allen Matkins Leck Gamble & Mallory. "The neighborhood is really coming up in arms about this."

In a joint letter to the homeowners' association, several residents expressed concern that the "square footage of the proposed improvements is well over three times as large as the square footage of all the other Country Oak homes combined.

"We are unified," the letter continued, "in our desire that the Duffields consider the option of scaling down their project considerably and relocating it to the existing residence site with certain reasonable limitations and restrictions based on what we all had during the construction of our homes."

Alamo resident Bruce Smith, whose family previously owned the 8,000-square-foot home that would be demolished to make room for the new house, said the land was never intended for a mammoth structure.

Smith added that the plans evoke the image of a "billionaire bully."

"He is trying to do to us what was done to him at PeopleSoft," Smith told the Associated Press. "This is sort of a takeover of our neighborhood."

In a letter to the homeowners association, Smith wrote, "[e]ven William Randolph Hearst in conceiving his castle matched his dreams with the land ... by buying more than 130,000 acres to surround his castle. Bryan Ranch isn't the right place for the applicant's castle."

The project includes an additional 25,000 square feet of other buildings, such as a 20-car underground garage. It would be constructed on 22 acres off Country Oak Lane, a rural street that serves seven homes at the eastern edge of the rural Bryan Ranch subdivision.

The house would be eight times larger than the home next door.

Richard Maxey, manager of the neighborhood's homeowners association, said some residents are in favor of the project.

"Some people ... think it will enhance their property values," Maxey said. 'There are a lot of emotions."

Gold said that the "goal is to make sure the correct architectural information is provided and that certain mischaracterizations are reduced."

"I'm very confident, given the quality of this project," he added.

With a $1.1 billion fortune, Duffield isn't as well-known or as wealthy as the founders of the world's largest software companies, Microsoft Corp. and Oracle Corp.

Bill Gates, Microsoft's chairman, tapped into his $51 billion fortune to build a 48,000-square-foot compound near Seattle. Oracle's chairman, Larry Ellison, spent $100 million of his 817 billion for, tune on a Japanese-style estate in the hills overlooking Silicon Valley, which is reportedly 10,000 square feet.

Duffield, 65, had been semiretired from PeopleSoft, living in a large estate near Lake Tahoe until Ellison launched a hostile bid for PeopleSoft in 2003.

Duffield returned to the Bay Area to run PeopleSoft a year ago in a last-gasp effort to thwart Ellison, but his company eventually sold to its larger rival for $11.1 billion.

Duffield received $800 million from the sale of his PeopleSoft stock in late December and early January, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing, although much of that stock was held in trust and there was no indication of the tax owed on those sales.

Duffield is using some of that money to start another Bay Area business applications software firm called Workday.

For now, the attorneys will await word from the architectural committee on the project's future. A response could come within a few weeks.

If the architectural review committee approves Duffield's plan, Durkee said he will appeal on behalf of the neighbors.

"And even if they receive the architectural committee's OK, they'll have to go to [Contra Costa] County to get the existing zoning guidelines amended," he said. 'That is where an environmental review would come in, and we'll point out what a project like this could do to the area."

Duffield could not be reached for comment

But Durkee stressed that the neighborhood does not oppose having the software executive as a neighbor.

Duffield was known for maintaining a friendly and paternalistic workplace at PeopleSoft, where managers served bagels and let employees come to work in flannels. As chief executive officer, Duffield signed company e-mails with his initials, DAD.

When Peoplesoft lost its bitter battle with Oracle, Duffield offered $10,000 of his own money to each pink-slipped employee making less than $150,000.

"The community is not against the Duffields--they think they are nice people--but this house would be huge,". Durkee said. 'There are some real concerns here."