Santa Ana Courts Progress With Arena-NBA Proposal : City Manager Sees Sport as Means to Growth

Santa Ana City Manager Robert Bobb isn’t modest about the development he predicts for his city: a 21-story office tower to accentuate the downtown, a 67-acre high-tech center, a $400-million shopping mall and now an arena he hopes will attract a professional basketball team.

Bobb says the domed arena and the hoped-for National Basketball Assn. team could spark his efforts to redevelop an aging city. “I think it’s clear we don’t have a Boston Commons or even a Seal Beach Pier. This could provide the focal point we need,” he said. “It will give us the national exposure we need and fit perfectly into our efforts to spur the economy of the city.”

But some of the other projects haven’t seen the light of day, and officials in Anaheim--who also have plans for an arena and a basketball team--say Bobb’s hopes for an inner-city renaissance are a long way from reality.

A Few Roadblocks

There have been a few roadblocks to realization of Bobb’s visions of a new Santa Ana: two studies by urban affairs experts urged the city to slow its redevelopment pace, and plans for a 32-story skyscraper were scaled back to the present 21 stories. And plans for a restaurant-theater complex in Centennial Park have met objections from area residents. But Bobb does not discuss the possibility that any of the projects will fail.

While projects may be on the drawing boards or in negotiation, he argues that none are pie in the sky. “We do not work on pipe dream projects; we just don’t have the staff or the resources,” he said. “We work on real deals.”

A deal for the construction of the arena, known as Westdome, has not been sealed, but a memorandum of understanding has been reached with the four-man partnership proposing to build it.

Allan Durkovic, one of the four, said he is “95% sure” that the arena will be built. However, he added, “You always have to leave a door open in case something unexpected happens.”

But Anaheim Mayor Don Roth said the announcement of a preliminary agreement to build the arena “doesn’t mean a thing.”

“I can put out a press release and say I’m going to build an arena in two years, too,” he said. “That’s just fanfare and PR as far as I’m concerned. And making money out of the deal (Santa Ana hopes to get about $600,000 by the sixth year of operation) isn’t going to be easy. I want to tell you, you can put a basketball team in there and a circus and what have you? And then just try to make that kind of money. I’ll believe it when I see it.”

If Santa Ana does pull this off, however, neighboring Anaheim still would make money, say Roth and Anaheim Councilman Ben Bay. A stadium in Santa Ana would bring customers to Anaheim’s hotels, restaurants and entertainment facilities.

“I don’t think Anaheim is overly concerned about competition. We have our convention center pretty heavily booked during the next four years,” said Bay. “If we can’t stand up to the competition, then we don’t deserve conventions.”

Anaheim Seeks Team

Roth stressed that Anaheim, which has talked with at least three NBA teams, still plans to bid for a professional basketball team despite a lawsuit by the California Angels baseball club. That suit against the city has tied up any development at the stadium.

“The logical place for a franchise would be in a new arena at Anaheim Stadium,” he said. “We feel very strongly that the missing link in Anaheim’s sports and entertainment network is an arena and a basketball team.”

But if Anaheim sees itself as the sports capital of Southern California, Bobb sees Santa Ana as the future urban hub of Orange County, complete with upscale night life.

Bobb’s plans have continued undaunted despite two studies commissioned by the city last year by Urban Innovations Group and Urban Land Institute, which concluded in part that Santa Ana should reduce the pace of its redevelopment and scale back its plans.

In response, the plans for the skyscraper were modified, but other projects continued.

“What the Urban Land Institute said was ‘Take the safe route. Concentrate on downtown only where there is a high probability of success and less financial risk,’ ” said Assistant City Manager Rex Swanson. “If we wanted to do the commonplace, we could follow the lead of Los Angeles or Santa Monica and a lot of other cities. I don’t think this city can take its place as the urban center of Orange County without taking some risks.”

Former Retail Center

Santa Ana was the retail center of the county until the 1950s and 1960s, Swanson said, when shopping malls and other retail centers outside the city began to lure businesses away. “Downtown was basically abandoned,” he said, and the area began to deteriorate.

The establishment of Santa Ana as a major, diverse urban center will hinge on the success of five developments, he said.

They are:

- Main Place, a $400-million expansion of Fashion Square with new stores including Nordstrom, I. Magnin and Robinson’s. A final agreement has been reached with the developers, JMB/Federated Realty and Henry Segerstrom, and construction should begin in the fall.

- McDonnell Douglas’ $100-million, 67-acre high-tech center to be built near the Costa Mesa Freeway and Edinger Avenue, which Swanson said could provide about 6,000 jobs. After some delay and the withdrawal of a school district plan to build a high school near the site when company officials balked, an agreement has been signed, he said.

- Westdome, which would rise at Civic Center Drive and Flower Street after aging Santa Ana Stadium has been razed.

- Centerpointe, originally planned as an office tower and the county’s tallest structure at 32 stories, has now been reduced to 21 stories, and plans for an eight-story hotel have been added. The developer, Carley Capital Group, has been granted exclusive rights to the project, but no agreement between the city and the developer has been signed.

- A Foreign Trade Zone earmarked for the downtown area that would allow businesses to import raw materials or export products--all duty-free. Bobb said negotiations are in progress with the U.S. Customs Service and the State Department.

In addition to those developments, Bobb said he wants some entertainment facilities and other attractions to bring people into the city at night.

Residents Oppose Plan

Centennial Regional Park, located at Fairview Street and Edinger Avenue, could be one solution to that problem. Plans for the park call for an amphitheater and dinner theater, along with lakefront dining and a farmers’ market. But at neighborhood meetings, residents have expressed opposition and argued the site should remain a park.

But the arena alone, Bobb says, might bring stores, restaurants and industrial firms to Santa Ana.

If all goes according to plan, he said, some day “it’s going to be very fashionable to have Santa Ana as your address.”