South Pasadena Revisits Its Downtown, City Redevelopment Chair Offers Prognosis

You are currently involved in revisiting South Pasadena's plans to revitalize it's downtown commerical district. What is your official role?

I'm chairman of the South Pasadena Community Redevelopment Commission, which was established a year and a half ago. We were charged by the City Council to come up with a plan for the redevelopment of the aging commercial core of downtown South Pasadena. We spent about six months developing a vision document that was subsequently used as the basis for recruiting a developer, with whom we've now entered into an exclusive negotiation agreement. Our vision is to build what I would characterize as a mixed-use, smart growth project, that would be intended to make better use of a lot of underutilized land in our downtown and be a catalyst to revitalization of the commercial center of the city.

Could you shed light on what led to the establishment of this South Pasadena Commission and define the scope of the planned revitalization plan?

Well, South Pasadena has a tremendously strong residential base, but it's got a very stagnant commercial area. The housing market almost couldn't be stronger, and yet, despite all of the value in the housing stock and all the money that's being invested there, it's not translating into support for the commercial core of the city. We have a very substantial commercial center that could far better support the city government with a tax base if it were more vital. It could keep people, activity and money in the City instead of exporting them to Pasadena or other parts of the LA Basin. Now, it is essentially a downtown of mom-and-pop businesses, many of which are hanging on by their fingernails.

The Redevelopment Commission became involved because the situation had reached the point at which the City Council felt like somebody needed to take serious action, but the Council itself could never quite make the time and commit the energy to do it. Also, the Council wanted to avoid a repetition of the last experience with a proposal for downtown redevelopment. About six years ago, there was a proposal by Wayne Ratkovich, who is an experienced and well-regarded developer of in-fill projects, to do a project in that same area. Unfortunately, it became a real debacle. The discussion focused far too early on the project itself, when it was just a concept and Ratkovich was still gathering information. People reacted very strongly against what they perceived as a project that was not consistent with the atmosphere and the history of the city. There was probably some basis for that criticism, but the criticism was premature. Ratkovich walked away from the project after putting a lot of time and money into it. Our hope was that the City and the developer alike could do things differently-better-this time. We wanted to find a developer who would come up with a project that would really appeal to the bulk of the citizenry and was better integrated into the architectural and historical fabric of the city. We also wanted to make sure that it was handled well from a community outreach standpoint and that there would be public support for it. That is what our Commission has really aimed to do over this last year and a half, and so far the feedback has been very positive for a community that often gets pretty worked up over proposals for any significant change.

It was very telling that, in our recent municipal elections, while the candidates differed on many, many issues, there were two things that they generally agreed on: their opposition to the 710 freeway being built through the City, and their endorsement of what our Commission was doing and the vision for revitalizing downtown.

Cary, this interview will be appear along side an interview with Randall Lewis, in which he opines on the building of suburban and ex-urban communities that are healthy vital places that create social infrastructure. Your commission appears to be pursuing similar goals but in a built out urban community. How are you approaching the task of building your city's social infrastructure. Is your goal, like his, to create a sense of "place"- a town center?

Well, it's an old city and it has a very substantial social infrastructure already. We have a great school system. We have all kinds of social institutions and organizations, and historic places like the Rialto Theater. Even though it's a relatively small city government, we have our own Police Department and Fire Department. It is a very self-contained community in most respects, with a great physical and social base on which to build. However, the commercial base of the city has languished for many years and has become so marginal economically that it doesn't provide nearly as much of a revenue base for the City as it could, and doesn't really provide the kinds of opportunities for shopping, dining and other entertainment that our residents want. It is often said that the City just lacks a sense of place. The City as a whole has an identity, but there isn't a central gathering place or focal point for the community. You wouldn't believe how many people have made this comment spontaneously to our Commission.

People from outside of South Pasadena believe that Bristol Farms is "the" gathering place.

Well there's a substantial number of people in the community who use places like Bristol Farms or Buster's coffee house for that purpose, but that just illustrates the desire for, and absence of, a real town center. People are saying that they want the equivalent of a town square or a plaza, a place that could have cafes, restaurants an shops around it, where you could go and routinely run into your neighbors, friends and business associates in a public setting. Most people also like the idea of introducing more residential uses in the area, to create more of a mixed-use environment, and one that would be active in both daytime and evening. Collectively, those things could be a catalyst for a real revitalization of the downtown area. It could also help tie together the business district along Fair Oaks Avenue and Mission Street with the Gold Line train station, the Farmers Market and other places where people already gather. The trick is to do it in a way that retains and builds on the underlying character of the community.

Elaborate on this place-making objective. How does the City attract a developer who will be comfortable with this goal?

The notion of creating a sense of place was one of the fundamental components of the vision document that the Commission prepared last year. The ability to address that goal was a major issue in our recent search for a developer who could work effectively with us. All the developers who responded to our request for qualifications read that vision document before they made their proposals and knew that that had to be a critical element of whatever was proposed. The developer that we selected-whom we're negotiating with now and who is in the process of gathering input that will be used to formulate an actual project proposal-has a very clear understanding about the importance of creating a sense of place in our downtown area.

We chose DECOMA, a Torrance-based developer that specializes in urban, infill and mixed use projects. They have a very impressive track record in the LA area and they are in partnership with New Urban West, which is a larger, more well-known developer of planned communities. Their team also includes Kaplan McLaughlin Diaz, an architectural and planning firm whose work we liked on other projects. So, among them, they have a pretty good set of credentials.

What is the authority of the South Pasadena Redevelopment Commission? How is it held publically accountable?

The Commission is fairly autonomous, but we ultimately report to the City Council. Anything having to do with acquiring property or actually approving a program ultimately goes to the Council. There is political accountability in the end, but the Commission has been given increasingly broad powers as the Council has gotten more and more comfortable with the way we've conducted ourselves and what we've produced so far. The commissioners themselves are a pretty impressive group in terms of their positions in the community. One member used to chair the Planning Commission. Another member's mother used to be the mayor and his family has deep roots in the City. Several members, including one who leads the local Chamber of Commerce, have had small businesses here for decades. Yet another member is a developer who has very strong ties to the substantial Chinese community. I don't have the long-time roots here that many of the others have, but my experience with real estate development and urban planning has been a useful resource for the Commission. It is a good, diverse and capable group that gets immediate respect from the community at large.

Lastly, what is the timeline for this downtown redevelopment project?

The developers are in the process of holding outreach meetings in the community, after which they will begin to put together a project concept. The exclusive negotiating period, which we're in right now, is scheduled to conclude around the end of this calendar year, after which we would enter into a disposition and development agreement with DECOMA and New Urban West. By that time, we hope to see a strong level of support in the community for this entire effort. Then will begin the long-term work of designing, processing and actually building the project.