VAN NUYS : GM Selects Broker to Market Property

General Motors officials told Los Angeles City Councilman Ernani Bernardi’s office Wednesday that they have selected a real estate broker to help sell their 101-acre Van Nuys property.

David Mays, Bernardi’s chief deputy, called the meeting a “courtesy visit to keep us up to date on the progress of their efforts to dispose of the property.” The Van Nuys plant, closed in August after four decades of auto production, is in Bernardi’s district.

The GM delegation, led by Claudia Killeen, an executive with Argonaut Realty, GM’s real estate arm, confirmed that no buyer has been identified.

Bernardi’s top priority is to find an industrial user who will put the existing plant back into production and provide “the same high-quality, blue-collar jobs” for local residents that GM had provided.

In recent weeks, city planners were urged by Bernardi to delay their review of a Bernardi land-use plan that would only permit industrial uses at the site. GM officials had warned Bernardi that his plan would limit the property’s marketability.