A Closer Look -- The center of attention

Andrew Glazer

COSTA MESA -- At times it was as tough as pulling in a 190-pound tuna,

another challenge R. Scott Bell relishes.

But like landing a trophy fish, the local developer said the struggle of

buying and renovating the crumbling Harbor Center was worth the reward.

Worth settling a costly lawsuit with unhappy neighbors. Worth the risk of

buying the land bit by bit, with the possibility that one or more than

five landowners might refuse to sell their portion, rendering the rest of

his holdings useless. Worth spending approximately $51 million to make

the center look “modern, even in decades to come.”

Bell, the wide-shouldered and driven president of the Santa Ana-based ICI

Development Co., said he loves a good challenge.

“The project was about persistence and timing and we’re known for being

persistent,” he said.

Many residents who had been concerned about noise and traffic during and

after the renovations to the 320,000-square-foot plaza, are now saying

they’ll shop there.

“I’ve already been shopping at Home Depot,” said Jesse Bequette, whose

home backs into the Home Depot. “And the stores give us additional

security in our yard.”

He was part of Neighbors of the Harbor Center, a grass-roots group that

sued ICI, fighting its plan to renovate the city’s original shopping

center last year.

Bell settled with the group, buying the people living closest to the

center double-paned windows and central air-conditioning. He also built a

masonry wall and a landscaped berm near Home Depot to buffer truck noise.

“Bell was quite reasonable,” Bequette said.

Other neighbors, such as Tamar Goldmann, said they can still hear the

sounds of beeping trucks and boxes being unloaded from their homes.

But now that the center’s three largest tenants -- T.J. Maxx N’ More

clothing store, Albertson’s supermarket and Home Depot home improvement

store -- have opened, Bequette said he had little to complain about,

except traffic on Harbor Boulevard.

At the opening of Albertson’s on Tuesday, hundreds of cars entered and

left the shopping center at rush hour. Still, cars traveling along Harbor

Boulevard flowed freely.

Some City Council members, especially Joe Erickson, were worried that

Home Depot might attract crowds of day laborers like its sister store in

Santa Ana.

But over the two weeks Home Depot has been open, the parking lot has been

free of people soliciting painting, construction and housecleaning jobs

Bell’s wife, Carle, was the project’s architect. Her design could be

easily described as funky industrial, complete with visible steel beams,

bolts and buttresses. Some stores have sloping, half-mooned roofs, others

zigzagging angles. The stores are painted various shades of browns and

beige and have permanent metal awnings held up by steel cables.

“We weren’t sure what we thought about it at first,” said Cheryl Pitzer,

district sales manager of Albertson’s. “But now, well, it’s pretty neat.”

Mayor Gary Monahan said the center, along with Triangle Square, will

bring new economic life to Harbor Boulevard.

He said the center was a “rat hole,” before it was renovated.

“Harbor Center was a rundown nest for transients and undesirables,” he

said. “It was dark, there was no security. There were hidden spots for

people to hole up in and it was a constant problem for the police

department to respond to all of the neighbor’s complaints.”

Bell wasn’t the first developer to notice Harbor Center’s potential.

“It doesn’t take a genius” he said. “There was no major retail in the

area. It was crying out!” Not to mention the center is on Harbor

Boulevard.

The catch was that, in the 1950s, Harbor Center’s original developers

opted to put stores in the center of the lot and surrounding them with

parking. Bell said that design was proven long ago to not work.

But it was impossible for Bell to buy the whole property, raze the old

buildings and start anew. The land was owned by more than five separate

entities, each with a different agenda.

But in 1988, Bell began to buy piece after piece of land. Bell said

Harbor Center wouldn’t exist today if just one property-owner had chosen

to hold onto their piece of land.

“It was a big challenge,” he said. “We had to invest a lot of time and

money.”

Several other developers sniffed around while Bell began his Harbor

Center buyout. But not one plunged in to take the risk.

Monahan credits Bell for being the only developer with the guts and

perseverance to stick it out.

“He was really good at hanging in there and negotiating with a lot of

different interests,” he said. “He’s really tenacious. He kept at it,

pounding at it like a brick wall.”