Land Sought for Sports Arena

Seeking to bring professional sports to the San Fernando Valley, a Tarzana entrepreneur has announced plans to build a 9,000-seat sports arena and entertainment complex in Woodland Hills that could house a minor league hockey team.

Mark Steele, a 32-year-old would-be developer, recently tried, and failed, to build a similar complex in Northridge. Now he says he plans to buy from Rocketdyne a 15-acre site at the northeast corner of Victory Boulevard and Canoga Avenue for the $60-million complex he wants to call the San Fernando Valley Sports Arena.

However, Steele has yet to make an offer on the property, a Rocketdyne spokesman said. And the investment banking firm named in connection with the project--Mariani Financing of Los Altos, Calif.--has made no commitments to back him, according to a principal with the firm.

Meanwhile, his efforts to obtain the hockey franchise license are still in their earliest stages, according to the West Coast Hockey League.

Reaction from city officials over the planned arena was mixed.

“Obviously this is a project that will have major impacts on the community,” said Ken Bernstein, planning deputy for City Councilwoman Laura Chick. “On the other hand the Valley lacks any venue of this type.”

A community meeting to discuss the plan is scheduled for tonight at 7 p.m. in the community room off the food court in Fallbrook Mall.

Besides the hockey arena, the proposal Steele has presented to city officials includes a training and recreation facility for volleyball, a country music restaurant, a sports-themed restaurant, about 20,000 square feet of so-called sports oriented retail space and a public transportation hub where bus and train lines will converge.

Steele also envisions housing a professional indoor soccer league team and volleyball team. And the arena--which would be roughly half the size of the Great Western Forum in Inglewood--would also attract circuses, ice shows and concerts, he said.

“This has a lot of potential for the Valley,” Steele said. “The Valley is searching for an identity of its own.”

The idea of establishing the Valley’s identity through professional sports is not new: The Valley’s United Chambers of Commerce has long held the position that the Valley needs a sports team for exactly that reason, said Bob Scott, past president.

But this notion failed to capture Gordon Murley’s imagination.

The president of the Woodland Hills Homeowners Organization is worried about traffic, and called the identity issue “hype that has nothing to do with problems of people getting to and from places.”

Steele, a graduate of Granada Hills High School who attended Pierce College, tried to develop a similar complex on Cal State Northridge University’s North Campus.

His company was one of four finalists selected for negotiations to develop the site. But Steele lost out to Hopkins Real Estate Group of Newport Beach.

Steele was “energetic and admired for the efforts he put forth,” said the university’s real estate development consultant John Rollow.

But the negotiations fell through over financing questions and doubts over Steele’s development track record, according to Rollow and Elliot Mininberg, a professor and member of the selection board.

Steele’s new plans, however, are attracting interest from potential partners.

Said Barry Kemp, owner of the Los Angeles Ice Dogs hockey team, with whom Steele hopes to join forces: “If they can get the arena built we are committed to putting a West Coast Hockey League team into that arena.”

Steele has even gone so far as to think of a name for the hockey team--the “Missiles” in honor of the Rocketdyne plant.