Testing a Commitment

The Los Angeles City Council will be selecting in the next few days a developer for the last large open tract in the Civic Center. It is a choice of significance. It is a decision that will test the council’s commitment to its fundamental responsibility to appropriate planning and financial responsibility. But extraneous political considerations already threaten to intrude in the decision process.

At stake is the use of eight acres making up most of the block north of 1st Street, east of San Pedro Street, south of Temple Street and west of Alameda. The existing shops along 1st Street, the Temporary Contemporary museum, the Union Church and the Nishi Hongwanji Buddhist Temple will remain--the church becoming a theater, the temple another museum. The city is offering a long-term lease of the land to a developer in exchange for construction of about 500,000 square feet of office space for city operations.

By the final deadline on Oct. 28, four proposals had been received. Since then the appropriate city departments, assisted by outside consultants, have been evaluating the proposals. Three have emerged as front-runners. One of the three proposals has now been recommended unanimously by the city departments. It is the proposal of SHOWA Village Associates--made up of Janss Corp. in a joint venture with Peck-Jones, Watt Enterprises and Okura & Co. The three bidders were judged more or less equal on the basis of their financial strength and experience and their design proposals, but SHOWA was rated substantially better in terms of the net cost to the city, and those financial considerations became the deciding factor.

The SHOWA project offers--in addition to the city office space--a hotel, more housing than the minimum sought by the city, and commercial space, all arrayed in a village-like arrangement that will minimize, in the judgment of the planners, the effect of the dense development.

There is good reason to be concerned about the effect of the development. From the first we have thought that the city was encouraging too much development in an already heavily developed area. These additions will bring rush-hour traffic to a crawl. The problem is complicated by vast federal construction just across Temple Street from the city’s 1st Street North Project, which is being done without regard to city planning. A 13-story, $40-million federal detention center is nearing completion, and the first of about 900 prisoners will be installed before the end of the year. Construction will begin shortly on an even larger structure--a 21-story, $95-million federal building with more than 1 million square feet of office space.

But the City Council is determined to press ahead, and, in that circumstance, there is good reason to act promptly. The decision, given the unanimous staff recommendation for SHOWA, would seem to be a simple one. But a second bidder has clouded the situation by amending its proposal after the deadline. This bidder, 1st Street Plaza Partners, is made up of Barker Interests Ltd., McCarthy Properties, Ohbayashi America Corp. and Taira Investment Co. Its most recent revision was the naming of six limited partners who together will contribute on the order of at least $1 million to the project and, perhaps more significantly, represent substantial ties to influential political leaders as prominent members of minority communities. None of the four bids had been judged in conformity with city standards for the employment of women and minorities, but the problem remains to be negotiated when the detailed contract is negotiated. That, it seems to us, is the appropriate time and place to address that question--not through amended proposals filed after the deadline.

The real meaning of these new developments may become clear on Tuesday, when the matter will come before a joint meeting of the City Council’s finance and revenue committee and planning and environment committee. We can only assume that, in fairness to all--not least the taxpayers--the committee will respect the diligent research and thoughtful recommendation of its own staff.