Council Approves Deal for Harbor Industrial Center

Despite allegations that it amounts to a giveaway of public funds, the Los Angeles City Council approved a deal Tuesday between the city’s redevelopment agency and a Wilmington oil company for 1 1/2 acres in the Los Angeles Harbor Industrial Center.

The company, Cooper & Brain Inc., plans to build a 29,800-square-foot industrial building on the property, which is at the corner of Quay Avenue and D Street in the Wilmington redevelopment project. Owner Bob Brain said seven tenants will occupy the building, providing 60 jobs in port-related businesses.

But several City Council members tried to kill the deal Tuesday because it calls on the Community Redevelopment Agency to sell the property for less than the agency paid for it. Under the agreement, the agency will sell the land for $305,000, even though it paid $461,000 for it six years ago and has spent an additional $179,000 on improvements.

“This is what you call Robin Hood in reverse,” said Councilman Ernani Bernardi, one of four council members who voted against the deal.

Added Councilwoman Gloria Molina, who heads the council committee that oversees the redevelopment agency: “This is a $350,000 giveaway. Don’t let them have it.”

Eight council members--the minimum needed--voted to approve the sale, with Eastside Councilman Richard Alatorre leading the supporters. Harbor-area Councilwoman Joan Milke Flores, said by an aide to favor the deal, was in Bordeaux, France, at a maritime conference and did not attend the meeting.

Alatorre, with the help of redevelopment officials, argued that the deal was designed to attract needed jobs to Wilmington and to upgrade the property, which had been used as a salvage yard. Alatorre said the agency has had difficulty attracting developers to the redevelopment area.

“This isn’t exactly Beverly Hills,” he said. “This is not a choice area.”

Len Betz, redevelopment agency manager of the project, told the council that letters were sent to property owners within the project area who had said they were interested in developing land there. Under state law, he said, the agency is required to give preference to those property owners. Cooper & Brain, which has office and industrial buildings at the corner of D Street and Eubank Avenue, was the only firm to respond, he said.

Molina and several of her colleagues, however, criticized the agency for limiting its search to property owners within the project area. They said the agency is allowed to seek other proposals--and accept them if they are clearly superior to those received from existing property owners.

“All we have is a neighbor who came and said: ‘Let me buy it. I am going to provide so many jobs,’ ” Molina said. “It is a bad deal.”

Agency Chief of Operations Robert Tague defended the sale price, arguing that it was based on two independent assessments of the property. Tague said the price was lower than the redevelopment agency’s purchase price because the agency has placed restrictions on what can be built there. The agency has required front- and side-yard setbacks, for example, that limit the size of the building to about half of what would otherwise be allowed, he said.

In addition, Brain said his company has agreed to spend about $225,000 to compact soil on the property and to remove some soil contaminated with oil. Cooper & Brain has also agreed to pay for the cleanup of any other hazardous materials that may be discovered on the property.

Brain said after the council meeting that he hopes to begin construction in about six months.