Feb
26
Council Meeting – 3/1/10 – 7PM
Filed Under 2010 Issues, City Council Meetings, Development, Planning & Zoning
[Ed Note: JM still... Dave is still away so I'm still posting for him. It's Friday, the City Council Agenda has been posted... ]
Don’t go to City Hall! As part of our historic 50th celebration, the City Council Metting has been moved to…
ST. ISIDORE PLAZA, 10961 REAGAN STREET
Not much to discuss… unless you consider the Consent Calendar.
A little background and then…
Once upon a time the Planning Commission was asked to consider the land use for a piece of property. The property, owned by Mr. Gibbs, used to be a 24 Hour Fitness. It is located on Katella Ave and the corner of Portal Drive.
After a number of Planning Commission meetings the Planning Commission recommended to the City Council that a zoning change be implemented for the property. And so it was. The property would get two tenants. The first would be a dialysis center and the second would be a restaurant. The Planning Commission spent a great deal of time on this decision and expressed a concern that “what if one tenant was able to come in but not the other?” As a part of that it was decided that this was the best land use, and the City Council agreed (although Councilman Edgar was vocal in his disagreement).
Fast forward to today and we have just the condition that Planning Commissioner Shloss brought up in the meetings at that time. One tenant is ready to occupy the facility (the dialysis center) and is going through the final stages of California required operations before getting certification of operation, the other has been unable to secure funding and is stalled.
Now the City Council is bringing the whole issue back with an intention to rezone the property away from the mixed use (bottom story being retail). This is NOT an issue of a landlord (Mr. Gibbs) requesting a rezone because he has another tenant lined up. This is the City Council making a judgment that this landowner should have the property rezoned even though the restaurant still has a lease with him (and assuming they could find funding would like to occupy that location).
Since the landlord has not requested a rezone, and since the Planning Commission had addressed just this issue (one tenant in, the other not) when the initial plan was approved by the Planning Commission and by the City Council, the only question to really be asked is just why the City Council is taking this drastic action? And why is this on the Consent Calendar rather than a Discussion item? A citizen would hope that there would be an open and frank discussion on just why the City of Los Alamitos would want to unzone a retail property on Katella.
http://www.ci.los-alamitos.ca.us/city_council/2010%20Agenda/3-1-10Web/03-01-10.htm
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18 Responses to “Council Meeting – 3/1/10 – 7PM”
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Let me try to understand this. Property on Katella was zoned changed to retail a year and a half ago and now the council wants to re-zone it?? Why? To what?? Office zone? Residential zone? Industrial zone? Isn’t the retail zone limited to businesses that pay sales tax to the City?
That is a pretty big corner and seems like a great place for some type of retail business. What was the old zone? The place has been vacant for a long time, was it because of the old zone?
Like the saying goes, “When you can’t figure it out, follow the money”. Looks like it ain’t gonna be sales tax money going into the city coffers. Wonder whose coffers/pockets the money will go into?
No city politics for us.
You got that right. Maybe Los Al needs to “unincorporate” for the 50th. What a joke!
Can you say, Law Suit? Get ready.
Yeah, lets try a lawsuit and then maybe all the info will come out. Especially about why the Melting Pot never showed any intention to putting in a restaurant. NOT even a sign that stated that the Melting Pot was coming in that spot? This whole thing is very fishy! Maybe the word “fraud” will come up?
If you have or had any information pertaining to fraud regarding the Melting Pot/DaVita project why didn’t you bring it to the planning commission?
[moderator hat on] Fran, as the current moderator here (while Dave is gone) may I suggest that you get the facts before throwing around a legal term, like “fraud”. [moderator hat off]
I spoke to Mr. Gibbs (the owner/landlord) last week (before making the original post) and he did confirm that he has a signed lease from The Melting Pot. He confirmed to me that The Melting Pot, to the best of his knowledge, still intends on occupying the property. That they worked out the liquor license issue with both the school and the church and that the only issue seems to be their inability to get the funding to start construction. [mod note: before posting, check the facts like a journalist should]
Far from “fraud”, it appears that the current financial climate of lending is the key problem in the project going forward.
As for the “Law Suit” that Joker seems to have made reference to. I think that as a community we should be concerned if the owner and DaVita made it known to the Planning Commission that they would still like to go forward even if only one of the businesses moved in (and they did), and they then spent money and resources (as apparently did The Melting Pot with planning) and then the City of Los Alamitos were to change the zoning, making the money they spent wasted, but spent based on an agreement with the City on the zoning of the property… While I am not an attorney, nor do I play on on the Internet, I would suspect that they would have a reason for a cause of action against the City, especially considering that just this situation (one tenant in, one not) was discussed prior to the approval of the zoning change.
Since it would be my City that would pay the cost using the reserves, I would prefer to avoid those costs at all costs.
My comments as prepared to the city council.
The developer spoke up and asked them to not do this…
An attorney for the developer spoke up and asked them not to do this…
The developer and the tenants (including the restaurant which has over $50,000 invested and spent) have over $2,000,000 invested in this project. They made it clear that they would consider litigation over this.
There was a great deal of talk over “process”. How the zoning change was “fast-tracked” and the need to revisit that. But there was no reason given why the process couldn’t be be revisited in a special meeting between the council and the Planning Commission where testimony was provided to them by former Planning Commission members who were involved, and maybe even former city employees who were involved. Councilmember Mejia specifically asked why this action, why this property and why now, and was never provided an answer to those questions by the other members of the council.
I have no skin in this game other than as a resident of the city who believes that we should be doing all we can to create more retail along Katella. If Edgar and Poe were really interested in the process and wanted to get that discussion going they could have called for a workshop, not started a legal process to reopen the whole issue about rezoning the property against the wishes of the owner and the tenants.
One would hope that there was an enterprising investigative journalist in our community who would be willing to go see just who does have skin in this game.
How can the Melting Pot people be serious about locating next to DaVita? I’m sure people will just love crossing paths, in the shared parking lot, with dialysis patients that are coming and going in various states of feeble disarray. Talk about a buzz-kill after a wonderful night of eating and DRINKING! Come on, get real!
Au contraire, mon frere. If you had watched the meeting you would have heard the comments from the DaVita representative. He said that in Beverly Hills there are two restaurants on La Cienega (Restaurant Row) that is in the same building as DaVita.
In my research of DaVita there are 1400 (and counting) locations around the U.S. Many are next to food establishments, in malls, etc. with no problems. Having a restaurant next to a DaVita is not unusual.
Next
Unfortunately JM, we all have “skin” in this game if you live, work or own property in Los Alamitos.
Once again it is Geri Mejia who comes to a meeting armed with the facts in the form of Planning Commission minutes and staff reports of what happened in 2008. Her research and comments about the lack of commerical funding for small businesses begged the question that she asked of her collegues, “What is the catalyst that is driving the zone change? Why are we piling on more problems for the business and landowner”. She received no answer from the businessMEN sitting next to her. I guess it is really hard to argue with preparation delivered with a strong dose of common sense.
The Lakewood Mall Davita is semi-discrete in location on the Del Amo side of the mall, and does not truly share the lot with anyone. Arbys drive-thru is the closest. Not saying it would bother everyone, but why add to the competitive challenge of running a successful restaraunt? Unless the rent was really low,but I doubt that?
As was mentioned earlier in a previous post, the rep from Davita spoke of two restaurants sharing a building with Davita. Davita was upstairs and the restaurants downstairs. They shared a common entrance to the building. The building is located next to another restauant, Lawry’s Prime Rib. That whole area ‘Restaurant Row” is very upscale.
As to Los Alamitos, keep in mind both the Melting Pot and Davita applied together for their entitlements to locate on Katella. The Melting Pot evidently did not have a problem with Davita, so why the second guessing about compatability? These are successful business people in the restaurant industry and it is up to them to make those decisions.
And that was precisely the attitude the Planning Commission took. However, the Planning Commission thought beyond the moment (something that is lacking with the present council majority)and were concerned that future retail uses may be troubled with a “Kidney Dialysis Center” sign next to their business. The PC imposed a sign restriction on Davita that limited the wording on their sign to one word, DAVITA with no reference to dialysis or what they do.
There is more to this “step backwards” change to Industrial zoning on our major arterial than the public is being told. Limp wristed protests about compatability is a smoke screen.
Why does any of this mater?
If you look around the city you will notice an ever increasing vacancy rate on our property. This problem of a business having a hard time finding a tenant is not new, it’s been happening in Los Al for some time, the current economic downturn has just made it worse.
When this happened property owners seek to find whatever business they can to take their property. Their job is to get income for space, and every day they don’t have that they lose money.
So when a prime location finds a way to generate a potential tenant the question in a business friendly city is, how do we help them?
In this case, after years of vacancy a prime location was able to develop a package deal where they would be able to get tenants into the facility. The question for the city is not “Will customers complain about the tenants?” As Art states, that is an issue for the two tenants that have indicated that they want to share common walls. It is not the red herring spewed at the Council Meeting about liquor licenses as it was reported that the tenant interested in that had already worked that out with the potential concerned neighbors (It’s not a gentleman’s club that was opening, or a bar, but a upscale restaurant).
The fact of the matter is that had the restaurant been able to secure funding, we would be looking at an operational location at this time. The economic climate is such that there is NO funding to secure. So the project has been put on hold. If the city was concerned with the loss of tax dollars then they should be doing what they can to help get the establishment in the city.If the city is concerned with shuttered buildings, then they should be focused on a heck of a lot more than one of the few that is bringing new tenants to town.
If the city council members are concerned about “process” (and that is the biggest line of bullcrap of all) then they should have a workshop to discuss the process that this went through and invite all the participants (past, and present) to discuss what they did, why they did it that way, and whether the results were what they anticipated, and then maybe what can be done differently or better next time. This is a standard business process called a “post mortum”. Opening up the can of zoning worms has no real purpose other than something that is NOT transparent.
In other words. The people on the dais couldn’t answer Geri’s questions because they are lying to us about their motives.
thank you for trying to make sense of the 4-1 city council vote to bring this Meting Pot/DaVita/Zoning on katella item back to the planning commission.
If any residents are reading this blog and wondering what’s going on maybe they should tune into the replays of the city council meeting on March 1 2010.
It’s getting really interesting.
This move by the majority council doesn’t surprise me at all. With Edgar and his constant insults to incoming businesses, his lack of respect for the residents and the City staff; Poe and her constant flip flop decisions; Stevens who always looks like he just walked out a pitch black room (dazed and confused); and how can we forget Zarkos who is arrogant and cocky. So I hope that you have all now seen what you get when the dirty trash man pays for the majority council seats. You get trash, “DIRTY” trash and lots of it. You watch when Edgar is done destroying our City he will be quick to move out of our City leaving us with all of his self-centered and egotistical trash. Oh I can’t wait to see Caroline and good ol’ Chuckie (Sylvia’s) faces when our City gets incorporated into Cypress and Seal Beach after all the money they poured into their good ol’ council majority. My feeling, anyone who voted for that majority deserves what they are about to get. Your stupidity and failure to know the truth just lost you this great City. Oh and Troy, can you please stop wearing the pink shirts with the Sergio Valente jeans it is so the 80’s.
…..and Ken Parker was less condecending, not rude to the staff, and a better dresser?
I want what your smokin’ Stephanie!
So you must be on the staff….or previous staff since there are not many left from that administration If so, then you do know that Ken Parker has always been polite to all staff. Even the one’s who were stabbing him in the back.
Edgar and Zarkos have been rude and condecending on camera many times to staff and residents, but this is not about that.
This is about the leadership currently elected to lead Los Alamitos with fiscal responsibility. That doesn’t seem to be happening. If you saw the city council meeting on 3/1/2010 you would know that.
Voice of What Reason?