CCDC May Buy Old Hotel in Cleanup of 4th Ave.

The City of San Diego doesn’t like many of the businesses on 4th Avenue, particularly the poker parlors, adult book stores, go-go clubs and other adults-only enterprises that face Horton Plaza, the city’s glitzy new downtown shopping complex.

It wants changes. To that end, the City Council has empowered the Centre City Development Corp.--its nonprofit redevelopment branch--to change the appearance and land uses on 4th Avenue between Broadway and G Street.

CCDC has embarked on a campaign of quiet persuasion with landowners in the area, which is part of the historic Gaslamp Quarter. In some cases it has worked, leading to restoration and rehabilitation; in other cases, it hasn’t.

So for the first time Friday, the board of directors of CCDC will be asked to approve buying property on the street--the venerable Windsor Hotel at 837 4th Ave. If the board approves, and the decision is reaffirmed by the City Council, it will be the first step in what could eventually lead to the city obtaining the hotel property through eminent domain.

But the city has no plans to keep the hotel. In a companion proposal, CCDC will be asked to approve opening negotiations with San Diego Hardware Co. Inc. The rear of the hotel abuts the 5th Avenue hardware store, which wants to buy it to expand its business.

According to a CCDC memo, meetings between the redevelopment agency and 14 property owners involved in what is called the “4th Avenue Project” have gone on for a year. Several of the owners have either agreed to upgrade their businesses and buildings or to have sold their property to new owners who have promised to make changes. However, the memo says, in at least two cases talks have proved fruitless, leading to a decision to buy the Windsor.

“The Windsor Hotel, recommended for acquisition at this time, is an instance where the owners have indicated a lack of interest in rehabilitating the property,” says the memo, signed by CCDC Executive Vice President Gerald Trimble.

Sheldon Zemen, whose family has owned the hotel since 1940, says he’s not ready to spend the $200,000 to $300,000 he claims would be necessary to meet the standards set by the CCDC.

“I’m not going to go into hock,” he said in a telephone interview from his home. “I’ve seen too many buildings around there which have been rehabilitated, only to be left standing vacant.”

Zemen, who refers to CCDC as the “Central Condemnation and Demolition Crew,” says he offered to repaint his building, a three-story brick veneer structure built about 1888, but that that wasn’t enough to satisfy the CCDC.

“They didn’t like my idea, I guess because I didn’t spend enough,” Zemen said. “You can’t win with these people after they’ve made up their minds.”

The hotel includes 33 rooms on its upper two floors, and Benjie’s Card Room and a vacant nightclub, the Opera House, on the ground floor. The Opera House is closed, but its sign proclaiming “Go Go Dames” still hangs outside the building.

CCDC spokeswoman Kathy Kalland said the agency has attempted to work with all property owners in good faith. Only after it found that some owners were reluctant to make changes did the agency order appraisals of six of the businesses and solicit proposals from developers interested in buying the properties, she said. The CCDC has budgeted $2.4 million to buy the 4th Avenue properties.

The CCDC selected San Diego Hardware from several developers who made proposals for the Windsor Hotel. The hardware company is located at 840 5th Ave., a site it has occupied since the early 1920s, and recently rehabilitated its store at a cost of $185,000.

William Haynsworth, vice president of the company and son of the building’s owner, Don Haynsworth, said CCDC “wants a commitment from us that we will negotiate with them if they condemn the building.”

“I’d say we’re still in the embryonic stage. I’d say the chances of it going through are less than 50-50. The present owner could sell tomorrow and end the whole thing,” said Haynsworth, noting that the negotiation period will last 90 days.

If the hardware company buys the hotel, Haynsworth said, plans are to expand the business into part of the hotel’s ground floor.