Renovate City Hall but Don’t Replace It, Group Urges

A downtown interest group Thursday proposed transforming the San Diego City Hall area off C Street into an expanded and renovated government complex, a plan it said would save $100 million over the current city initiative to build a new civic center at the east end of downtown.

San Diegans Inc. also called for city and county officials to write a “master plan” for the 10-block area around the Charles C. Dail Community Concourse, allowing the two governments to create a mall of city offices, courthouses, court offices and a jail in the same section of downtown.

“What we’re trying to do is restart the debate on (city offices) staying where they are,” said Wayne Raffesberger, executive director of the downtown advocacy group.

City plans, now on hold because of budget constraints, call for construction of a $275-million city government complex at 12th Avenue and Broadway. San Diegans Inc. had supported that move, provided it was not too expensive, but now believes that leasing existing government buildings will not provide enough revenue to finance the project.

Having outgrown the 310,000 square feet it owns at City Hall and the City Operations Building, San Diego rents an additional 334,000 square feet of office space at an annual cost of $6 million, said Deputy City Manager Maureen Stapleton.

San Diegans Inc. claims that its proposal would cost $175 million. The group did not identify a financing plan.

The San Diegans Inc. plan calls for the city to acquire and rehabilitate the Security Pacific and California Bank buildings; rehabilitate City Hall; demolish the Convention and Performing Arts Center to reopen B Street and build a new City Council chambers where that center building now stands.