Sean Belk
Staff Writer
Adding more free parking, addressing homelessness and fetching quality retailers in the downtown area were the main issues brought forward by residents in the 8th Council District this week regarding a massive project to rebuild the Long Beach Civic Center.
Representatives with Plenary Edgemoor Civic Partners (PECP), a development team chosen by the City Council last December to take on the project that involves a public-private partnership, stopped by the district this week to ask residents about the endeavor.
The community meeting, which drew a crowd of about 25 residents to the Expo Arts Center in Bixby Knolls on Wednesday, Feb. 11, was the third gathering in the city so far to receive input from residents. The Council has agreed to conduct an outreach meeting in all nine Council districts.
“This is a major undertaking for the City of Long Beach,” said 8th District Councilmember Al Austin. “The City Council has voted to move forward and has selected a design team we think has come back with the best design and package.”
The council member said that, while the development team has already brought forward a design, the “vision” for the project won’t be complete without “robust community participation and input.”
With construction expected to begin in 2016, the project includes building a new City Hall, a new Port headquarters and a new main library. It also includes completely redeveloping Lincoln Park while adding private development, including a 30-story residential tower that would have 600 permanent residential units, 200 units for hotel use and 40,000 square feet of retail on the ground floor.
The Council’s decision to move forward with the downtown overhaul was prompted by seismic studies, first conducted in 2005 and 2006 out of federal mandates, that declared that both City Hall, which houses 896 employees, and the main library that were built in the late 1970s are “significantly seismically deficient” and would be public-safety risks in an earthquake.
Mike Conway, Long Beach director of economic and property development, said during the meeting this week that the City has been able to take measures, such as removing dirt from the roof of the existing library and installing shelters in the current City Hall building, to reduce the risk of loss of life in a major seismic event.
However, he said a seismic study conducted in 2013 indicated that, in a large earthquake, the fourth through seventh floors of City Hall would “wobble,” causing steel to compromise and forcing portions of the building to collapse. This new study is what propelled the City to move more quickly on the currently proposed project, Conway said.
“We were much more compelled to proceed and determine an alternative to City Hall in a more rapid fashion because we didn’t want to get exposed to loss of life either for staff or visitors to City Hall,” he said.
Conway and project designers stated during the meeting that the new City Hall building, Port headquarters and main library would be completed and ready for occupancy in the next four to five years and would exceed current building codes for seismic standards. Former 8th District Councilmember Rae Gabelich questioned why the City hasn’t brought forward a cheaper or quicker alternative. Conway responded, however, by stating that the public-private partnership, also known as a P3 project, is the “fastest route.” However, he admitted that, until the new structures are built, the City faces “some significant liability.”
City staff has noted that retrofitting City Hall would cost an estimated $170 million when including design and engineering costs and moving and lease expenses for temporary facilities during construction.
However, rebuilding the Civic Center through a P3, the same development model used for the construction of the Governor George Deukmejian Courthouse in downtown Long Beach, would cost no more than $12.6 million annually (plus inflation), the City’s current costs for maintaining the Civic Center structures.
The majority of the project, aside from the new Port headquarters, is being paid for through private loans with interest as part of the financing model. The developer, which would take over maintenance of the entire Civic Center structures for 40 years, would also be given a portion of City-owned property, estimated to be worth about $30 million, as an incentive for private development.
During the meeting, Jeff Fullerton, director of Costa Mesa-based Edgemoor Infrastructure & Real Estate, presented renderings and a 3D model of what the team has so far designed for the project. He said some residents, so far, have expressed interest in bringing in small-business retailers, a seasonal ice rink or making it more “market friendly” with crafts and farm-fresh food.
“We’re looking for ‘What’s the draw?'” asked Fullerton, who worked on the courthouse project in Long Beach as well. “What’s going to bring you downtown?”
A majority of 8th District residents, however, explained that the main disincentive to shopping and visiting downtown is the need to pay for parking.
Former Long Beach 9th District councilmember Val Lerch said he frequents restaurants in Lakewood Center Mall rather than downtown because of parking costs in addition to dealing with public-safety risks related to transients.
“I think, probably, most everybody here don’t go down there as often because of the parking we have to pay for,” he said. “And then, when we get downtown, we walk and we got to deal with knuckleheads.”
Fullerton, however, noted that 17,000 parking spaces currently exist in downtown, mostly in parking structures, aside from 850 new spaces for the project. He said the project might entail offering parking-validation options.
In regard to homelessness, Fullerton explained that redeveloping Lincoln Park, including adding lush landscaping, spaces with “event lawns” and connecting 1st Street and other streets into a “pedestrian plaza,” would, over time, help make the site a place for “everybody” to enjoy.
He added that the Santa Monica Promenade was once completely occupied by homeless, but, as people found more reasons to visit the area, it became more of a place for the “general, broad cross section of the public.”
Fullerton added that addressing homelessness is “a challenging problem” and the development team plans to work with local agencies to assist the homeless. He noted that the project is expected to create 3,700 new local jobs.
Some residents, however, were skeptical about the project, expressing disdain about retail development that has taken shape in downtown, specifically The Pike, which Bixby Knolls resident Ken Cordua called “a shabby, nasty-looking place with bad architecture.”
Cordua said he would like to see “high-quality” retailers. However, the only proposal for a new retailer was from Gabelich, who suggested bringing in an Apple computer store.
“I have had a hard time saying, ‘yeah, let’s go for it,’ when I’ve seen so many other projects fail and it’s just one disappointment after another,” Cordua said. “So I wish you the best of luck going forward, but I do want to see something that’s attractive with quality retail and great restaurants. I don’t care about parking. I can walk a few blocks. It doesn’t matter to me. I just want something that is a high-end, quality project.” ß