West 19th Street awaits word on its future

Alicia Robinson

Many Westside business owners welcome improvements to the business

corridor on 19th Street, but their opinions on how much redevelopment

is needed and who should initiate it are scattered.

A little nip and tuck here or there? A city-driven, intensive

renovation that could sweep in new businesses? Fixes done by business

owners as they see fit?

All these strategies and more have been part of the years-long

debate about how to clean up parts of the Westside. Lately, the city

has been mulling the creation of a redevelopment district, including

19th Street between Maple Street and Federal Avenue and five parcels

on Center Street south of 19th Street. Business owners and city

officials are awaiting specific recommendations from the

Redevelopment Oversight Committee, a group made up of about 30

residents and businesspeople. The committee is expected to give the

city a report of its recommendations in September.

A 2003 study showed that turnover in the 19th Street commercial

corridor is twice as high as elsewhere in the city, and lease values

there are lower.

The area originally proposed for redevelopment was much larger --

440 acres compared with the 50 acres now considered -- but an outcry

from industrial property owners led the city to reduce the

redevelopment plan to exclude them, city redevelopment manager Mike

Robinson said.

As for the smaller area, people have been curious about what the

city is planning, but there hasn’t been much controversy so far, he

said.

“I didn’t mind what they had planned in redeveloping [the area],”

said Mike Faulkner, co-owner of Faulkner’s Mower Shop on 19th Street

near Placentia Avenue. “On the other hand, I don’t think this is

quite the ghetto it’s been portrayed.”

He’ll be ready to retire in a few years and doesn’t want to lose

his business to redevelopment before that, he said, though some

cleanup would be good for the area.

Frank Gutierrez is one of the business owners backing extreme

redevelopment. He’s a member of the Redevelopment Oversight Committee

and owner of Mesa Art and Framing on 19th Street near Placentia

Avenue.

The committee is looking at proposing additional zoning to allow

mixed-use development so property owners could create commercial and

industrial spaces with residential lofts, he said. In Santa Ana, loft

spaces sold for $220,000 two years ago are now worth more than

$500,000, he said, and lofts would fetch even more in Costa Mesa

because they’re just minutes from the beach.

Under such a plan, hungry developers would likely buy up

properties, and some businesses would be forced to move if unable to

adapt to the already changing economics and population in the area,

Gutierrez said.

“As a business owner, you have two choices,” he said. “You either

evolve with the area, or you leave the area.”

Other business owners are more skeptical about full-scale

redevelopment, worrying they might be the ones driven out when

increasing property values cause their rent to climb.

The area already has a good mix of commercial and residential

properties, and redevelopment would upset that, said Dean Hassanali,

owner of Sign Depot on 19th Street near Anaheim Avenue.

“It really penalizes independent small business owners,” he said.

“I think most of the people that I’ve talked to feel the way I do.”

The best method of redevelopment, he added, is letting competition

encourage businesses to improve themselves. In the seven years he’s

owned his business, Hassanali has seen improvements pop up without

any prodding from the city, he said.

“I think that’s already happening,” he said. “People are doing

that on their own because they want to attract more business.”

* ALICIA ROBINSON covers business, politics and the environment.

She may be reached at (949) 764-4330 or by e-mail at

alicia.robinson@latimes.com.