ValleyVote Update for 02-19-01 |
We are sending you this E-mail as you have requested to be notified concerning ValleyVote
See our Website and all the Updates are archived on our site.
Comparing the LA City CRA North Hollywood project vs. the Burbank Lockheed project
The Empire strikes back, and so does the city of Burbank.
Nearly a decade after losing Lockheed Skunk Works, one of the city's major industries that employed 20,000 workers, the city [Burbank] last week broke ground to turn the vacant site into a $300 million retail, commercial and office project. Burbank officials have worked hard to make their city an example for the entire region.
It's been a long, slow process to turn the site where aircraft such as the stealth fighter were built into a new venture that will benefit the community. Part of the problem was decontaminating the old manufacturing site and ensuring its safety.
The project by developer Zelman Development Co. will encompass about 908,000 square feet of retail space and include Lowe's Home Improvement, Target, Staples and Best Buy stores. The center is expected to generate some $3.2 million a year in tax revenue for Burbank.
Losing Lockheed hit the community hard. And it has taken years to recover. But the city didn't surrender and walk away from the problem, unlike city officials in neighboring Los Angeles.
They persevered. They ensured the site was cleaned up and put together a new project more environmentally friendly. They worked with companies to attract the best projects.
If only L.A. could operate that cleanly, efficiently and productively. If only the elected leaders and bureaucrats in Los Angeles cared as much about deteriorating neighborhoods and communities in dire need of a helping hand, like Van Nuys, Pacoima or North Hollywood.
Turning an area around isn't impossible when resources, time and energy are spent to fix the problems. Burbank is to be commended for its success.
Now let's see the same quality of leadership brought to bear in North Hollywood, just a few miles from the Skunk Works, where a redevelopment project has languished for years.
By Beth Barrett Staff Writer
Convinced a new developer is the best chance to get the long-stymied North Hollywood redevelopment project built, the Community Redevelopment Agency board Wednesday gave Jerry Snyder 60 days to come up with a vision for the community to include a new high school.
Snyder earlier this week signed an agreement taking over a majority interest in the 23-acre project from Santa Monica developer Allen Radford, whose plans for multiple sound stages, movie theaters, offices, retail shops and apartments never materialized.
CRA commissioners said they were willing to wait a couple of months more on the strength of the "acquisition and contribution agreement" Snyder signed, with commission president Peggy Moore calling it a "strong, valid contract." Snyder immediately promised to complete designs, to obtain financing and to work with the Los Angeles Unified School District on the high school, which could take up to 11 acres, or about half the property.
"These won't just be pretty pictures," said Snyder, a long-time developer, who has worked throughout the city, including projects along the Miracle Mile in Wilshire, in Santa Monica and in the San Fernando Valley. Snyder told the Daily News the economics of the North Hollywood area, coupled with the new MTA subway station, make it far more feasible to develop now than a few years ago when the redevelopment was envisioned.
The outer boundaries of the project run roughly from Lankershim and Chandler boulevards, and Fair Avenue on the west, Cumpston Street on the north, Vineland Avenue on the east and back to Chandler on the south. LAUSD wants to carve out the section bounded by Fair, Cumpston, Vineland and Chandler for the new high school. The property now is occupied mostly by a state Department of Transportation maintenance yard.
Snyder said that with the addition of the school, the scope of the redevelopment project will change, but that he remains committed to a mix of new offices, retail sites and apartments. Environmental studies for the project won't have to be redone, as they assumed a larger project, he said.
Radford, who in a surprise move last week dropped LCOR from the project, said Snyder is the right choice. "He'll do a terrific job," Radford said.
CRA Administrator Jerry Scharlin said he believes the project is "headed in the right direction."
"It's not for certain it won't blow up, but now we have a sense with all the agencies as to where they are. And, I think having a new lead on the project is important to everyone."
A local labor coalition said they too were optimistic Snyder will finally be able to break ground on a project. With up to 5,700 jobs at stake, [Most short term construction] representatives of the Valley Jobs Coalition said, and based on Snyder's record elsewhere, they anticipate getting acceptable wage and benefit terms.
"Right now we feel very confident that Snyder will work with us," said Jeffrey Farber, spokesman for the coalition, which is a project of Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy, known best its work on the city's living wage ordinance. [Which does not apply to the Burbank project]
Development: Snyder 'guarantees' a deal for business space and new school near subway station.
By PATRICK MCGREEVY, Times Staff Writer
A veteran Los Angeles developer stepped forward Wednesday and pledged to city officials to bail out the troubled North Hollywood commercial development project. Seeking the blessing of the Community Redevelopment Agency, Jerry Snyder said he can satisfy the demand for commercial and retail development around the new subway station and accommodate a new high school nearby as well.
"We will take it over and we will get it done," Snyder, an experienced developer, told the CRA board. "I guarantee we will have an iron-clad, done-deal agreement by your next meeting." Snyder's surprise entry into the crisis that has engulfed the $361-million project, designed to fully realize the potential of the new subway station which opened last year, took some officials by surprise.
The city had been working exclusively for 18 months with developer J. Allen Radford, who had announced a tentative deal with LCOR, another Los Angeles-based developer, to be his financial partner earlier this year. Radford had been told to provide a final development deal by Wednesday or face loss of the project.
Instead, Radford on Wednesday announced he had dropped LCOR and was set to deal with Snyder. Further muddling the picture were representatives of LCOR, who urged the board to open the project to bids from all developers, charging Radford and Snyder do not have the experience and financing to tackle such a complicated project.
The agency board Wednesday decided to step back for one week, giving Radford yet another chance to resuscitate the project while responding to demands some of the land be dedicated for use as a new high school. We are looking at a week to clear some dust," said Board Chairwoman Peggy Moore.
The jarring eleventh-hour changes led board member Doug Ring to suggest the agency may have to open the project up for competitive bids from other developers if Radford and Snyder fail to finalize their project by Feb. 7. "There will be more high drama," Ring predicted.
Talks Include Building School
Snyder is also planning a $140-million redevelopment of Valley Plaza shopping mall. He promised the board to have a signed joint venture partnership agreement by next Monday that would make him the lead developer, relegating Radford to providing the land. Snyder said he had talked with Los Angeles Board of Education member Caprice Young about incorporating a proposed high school into the commercial, residential and office development he wants to build next to the North Hollywood subway station.
Snyder said the project would probably remain about 2 million square feet, but he prefers to add apartments to the mix of shops, restaurants and offices Radford had proposed. He also said a proposal for movie theaters and film sound stages, originally proposed by Radford, would not be part of the initial development.
Because Radford already has ownership or options on much of the property, Snyder said construction could begin in January 2002 if the board approves the project. Skepticism abounded. Some board members contended that no more extensions should be granted to Radford. Ring described Snyder as Radford's "developer du jour."
The Radford land is considered the key to wider revitalization in North Hollywood. Officials had long considered the adjacent subway station as the launching ramp for rebirth. The nearby NoHo Arts District, a struggling collection of theaters, was also expected to benefit from the development.
Riordan Deputy: 'We Can Make This Work'
The redevelopment issue was complicated recently when the Los Angeles school board announced it wanted to use a Caltrans parcel for a school. The parcel had been part of the Radford project.
Mayor Richard Riordan believes the North Hollywood
commercial development is a high priority but that it should go forward as part
of a larger plan that also considers the school district's needs for a new
campus in the area, said Joanne Halbert, an assistant deputy mayor.
Halbert said she will meet with school officials
during the next week to try to find a way for the high school and the commercial
development to both be built.
"We think we can make this work for all
parties," she told the board. "We can accommodate the high school but
not at the detriment of the redevelopment project." [
the school will pay no taxes to the CRA is why they oppose it]
Howard Samuels, an executive with LCOR, said he learned Tuesday afternoon that Radford was bowing out of their tentative partnership. "I thought I had a deal with the existing developer," he said.
Renee Weitzer, an aide to Los Angeles City Council President John Ferraro, urged the board not to put the commercial project out for new competitive bids, [LA city avoids public bidding almost every time and does "negotiated" deals] which could delay it by six months. "If you go out for [bids] this project is dead," Weitzer warned.
WHILE North Hollywood desperately awaits long-overdue redevelopment, a single, massive, unmovable obstacle stands in its way: City Hall.
Specifically: the Community Redevelopment Agency, Mayor Richard Riordan, City Council President John Ferraro and Councilman Joel Wachs, who carve up the Valley under the city's gerrymandered district system that lets everyone off the hook. Preoccupied with their own self-interests and the interests of downtown, they have ignored prime real estate in North Hollywood.
The property is above the new subway station, adjacent to the burgeoning arts and theater district and in the neighborhood of Warner Bros., Universal and Disney. [All in adjacent Burbank] It ought to be a jewel at the heart of this entertainment district; instead, it's empty.
Two years ago, the CRA awarded building rights to Santa Monica developer Allen Radford. Radford promised the world -- sound stages, garden offices, shops, stores and a multiplex. He didn't have the money to do any of that then and he doesn't now.
His contract for exclusive developments lapsed this week with his pie-in-the-sky plans still up in the air. Incredibly, the CRA is debating whether to give him his umpteenth chance or to allow the umpteenth potential developer to take it over without a plan at all, only a promise.
So where are your leaders? Nowhere to be found as usual. That's why so many people in the Valley want to secede and form their own city. They're tired of failure, of being let down by city leaders downtown.
Land use: As deadline nears, builder of key project reaches tentative financial deal, but CRA doubts proposal will be ready.
By PATRICK MCGREEVY, Times Staff Writer
The builder of a commercial project designed to be the cornerstone of North Hollywood redevelopment announced a tentative agreement with financial backers Thursday even as city officials questioned whether the project will be ready for approval by a Jan. 31 deadline.
Developer J. Allen Radford said he and representatives of the firm LCOR have tentatively agreed on terms of a joint venture partnership. He said he hopes to have papers signed in time for a special meeting of the Community Redevelopment Agency Board on Jan. 31. "There is no doubt it will be done in time," Radford said. [It was not done]
But agency officials told the board Thursday they are doubtful they can finish the required environmental review process for the project by the deadline. "Then you have a project that has just tubed," said Community Redevelopment Agency Board member Doug Ring, who told the backers he is unwilling to grant a third extension of negotiations to Radford past the deadline.
If the deal does not come together in time, Ring said he would press to reopen the competition to other developers interested in building on CRA-owned property south of the North Hollywood subway station. While Ring insisted the environmental work must be completed at the time the board approves a development agreement with Radford, board President Peggy Moore said she is more concerned that Radford signs the agreement and has a deal with a financial partner by Jan. 31.
"I would hope that after 18 months he absolutely has the partners in place and a signed deal," Moore said. Radford proposed 1.8 million square feet of shops, restaurants and office towers on land he and the CRA own south and east of the subway station. The project has been troubled since its inception, when Radford proposed 4 million square feet of development. Market conditions forced some elements of the project, including 10 film sound stages, to be dropped.
CRA administrator Jerry Scharlin said Thursday that that after talks with Radford, it is still unclear whether the developer will meet the deadline for signing up a joint venture partner to help finance the project. "I will see what happens on the 31st. It's down to the last moment," Scharlin said.
The administrator said the board's warning to Radford on Thursday was meant to put pressure on Radford to take the deadline seriously. Even if a partnership agreement is reached between the two firms in the next few days, Radford said that would leave less than two weeks for the CRA staff to finish its own review of the partnership and development agreement, including time-consuming financial analysis and appraisals of the land involved.
The shortage of time might also hamper the ability of the CRA to complete the environmental review process by the deadline, said Pauline Lewicki, a senior planner for the agency. At a hearing on a draft environmental impact report, Lewicki told the board Thursday that the agency must respond in writing to public comments and circulate the final report, with responses, 10 days before the board acts. That would mean the staff would have to complete the report in time to mail it out Saturday, just two days after the public hearing.
Asked if that can be done, Lewicki told the board it is "impossible" but said she would try. Moore and board member Coby King said that if the required development agreement and partnership are finalized by the deadline, they would consider providing a short extension to wrap up the environmental process.
Under the proposed development agreement, the CRA would be obligated to spend up to $5 million to buy land for the project, in addition to a requirement to use property tax proceeds in future years to reimburse the developer for expenses, officials said.
AOL version 6.0 now AOL properly reads HTML mail . I would recommend it all AOL users to get the free update from AOL. It will make all your HTML mail work so you can see the formatting and highlights and use the jumps to see referenced documents.
But to fully see the update and use the jumps you need to go to the website http://www.ValleyVote.org/updates/index.html and read the update from there with all the information that AOL strips.
** NOTICE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C., section 107, some material is provided without permission from the copyright owner, only for purposes of criticism, comment, scholarship and research under the "fair use" provisions of federal copyright laws. These materials may not be distributed further, except for "fair use," without permission of the copyright owner. **If you friends want to be added to our E-mail list please send an E-mail with ValleyVote as the subject. We share our e-mail list with no one. Charles Brink Webmaster. If you want to have your name removed from the list just reply with remove as subject |