Pomona Changes Tack, Cancels Study

Fearing that their cautiousness could jeopardize the proposed Inland Pacific World Trade Center, City Council members have reversed a previous decision and voted not to hire an independent consultant to analyze the $96-million project.

The analysis, which would have cost about $15,000 and taken six weeks, had been requested last month by Councilwoman Nell Soto, who has been openly skeptical about the financial integrity of the project’s promoter and co-owner, H. Thomas Felvey.

By a 3-1 vote, the four-member council agreed on June 22 to seek the study. On Monday, however, the council voted 3 to 1 to forgo the analysis and proceed with plans to construct the 14-story trade center.

“You can study something to death,” Mayor Donna Smith said in an interview after Monday’s meeting. “I’m not willing to stab a dagger into the project.”

Soto, who ended up being the only dissenting council member, said she was irritated at having spent the last month interviewing potential consultants for nought.

“If the council hadn’t intended to hire one in the first place, we never should have gone through that exercise,” she said. “We were sincerely trying to do something. . . . We spent a lot of hours.”

The reversal came at the urging of several local business leaders who told the council that they believed any further delays could damage the city’s efforts to attract commercial development.

“Studies by consultants seldom come up with answers. They tend to be vague and ambivalent,” Philip Pumerantz, president of the Pomona Chamber of Commerce, wrote in a letter to the council.

“It is our opinion you will be in the same position you are in now when the study is complete, except that you may have done irreparable harm to the city’s credibility in the process,” Pumerantz wrote.

Chuck Trapp, president of the Pomona Economic Development Corp., said he believed that the city staff members, who have prepared all the documentation for the project, already have done the analysis that the council sought.

“You’d just be hiring another consultant to do what an army of consultants has already done,” he said. “It’s a case of overkill.”

Felvey, who holds exclusive rights to negotiate for the development of the downtown trade center site, became a source of concern for the council after a story in The Times outlined how the Orange County architect had left a trail of debt and unfinished projects throughout the Los Angeles area over the last decade.

According to Los Angeles County Superior and Municipal Court records, Felvey and three of his corporations are the subject of at least 12 uncontested default judgments for debts ranging from $1,000 to $96,000.

Severed Ties

After interviewing more than two dozen former business associates and employees, it was learned that four firms that have done work directly connected with the proposed Inland Pacific World Trade Center have severed ties with Felvey because they contend that he or his corporations still owe them money.

Felvey, 41, has said that his professional difficulties should have no bearing on the 1-million-square-foot international business complex he hopes to build on a 4.5-acre site across from City Hall.

Council members, however, have responded with caution. At a June 8 meeting, they balked at a plan to provide Felvey with the land he needs to build the project until they could meet personally with all his development partners.

Still seeking reassurances about the extent of risk being assumed by the city, council members then decided to hire an independent redevelopment consultant to analyze the project.

“I had hoped that if there was anything we had not been aware of that might be a higher risk than we thought to be, the independent consultant could have told us,” Soto said. “It would have made me feel better.”

Although other council members said they believed the city was already well protected, they agreed to hire the consultant as a way to get unanimous support for the project.

“I think it’s so important and such a boost to the city that it deserves the full support of the City Council,” said Councilman Mark A. T. Nymeyer, who helped Soto interview potential consultants. “In so many words, I put my foot into the camp of people who tend to look at the project with a little bit of a jaundiced eye.”

Support Eroded

However, when Soto and Nymeyer returned to the council on Monday recommending that their colleagues hire the Claremont consulting team of Gunn, Russell, Copenhaver & Co., support for the idea had eroded.

Councilman E. J. (Jay) Gaulding, who had initially voted to hire a consultant, said that that had never really been his intention.

“It was very unclear at the time,” he said. “I thought they were just going to take it up again and see what was going to be done on it. I’ve never supported” paying for the study.

A motion to hire the consultant failed on a 2-2 vote Monday, with Gaulding and Smith dissenting. Then, when Smith proposed proceeding with the trade center plans without the study at the “earliest possible” date, Nymeyer changed his vote and the show of support passed 3 to 1.

“We should stop giving energy to the negatives and start dealing with the positives,” Smith said.

Under an agreement approved April 15, the City Council has voted unanimously to issue $100 million in revenue bonds for the project, giving Felvey and his partners the means to finance construction of the trade center.

Before any of the money will be released, Urban Equities Ltd., of which Felvey is the general partner, must compile sufficient credit guarantees or other forms of security, city officials said.

The bonds, which have been sold to two Minnesota banks, will be repaid by Urban Equities as revenue from the project is generated, according to the officials.

Pay for Garage

As part of the deal, the city has agreed to pay for construction of a $13-million underground garage with bonds issued by the Pomona Redevelopment Agency and establish a $1-million promotional campaign to be funded by taxes from a proposed 260-room hotel.

Additionally, the city has obtained a $5.2-million loan from the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development that will be used to help finance the project.

Like a central market or commercial strip, trade centers operate under the philosophy that concentrating firms in one building will propel it into a worldwide commercial network, ultimately attracting more business activity to the region.

Felvey has called Pomona an ideal location for such a complex because of the city’s proximity to freeways, rail lines and the Ontario International Airport. As one of the fastest-growing regions of the country, the Inland Empire could become a major center for international trade, he has predicted.

Besides attracting more business to Pomona, city officials have estimated that the project would create 3,000 jobs and generate more than $1 million a year in general fund revenue.