Apartments Opened on Earthquake Site

Developers and city officials officially marked the opening of a $10-million low-income apartment complex Thursday on the site of an apartment building destroyed by the 1994 Northridge earthquake.

The Coral Wood Court Apartments are one of five apartment projects in the San Fernando Valley undertaken by the public-private Los Angeles Redevelopment Corp. since the quake. Three are operational, including Coral Wood, which has rented 74 of its 106 units. The others are scheduled to open next year.

“Let this be a symbol to the neighborhood that this is not a ghost town,” said Tony Salazar, executive vice president of McCormack, Baron & Associates, a St. Louis-based affordable-housing developer and partner in the Redevelopment Corp.

“I was here shortly after the earthquake. I walked through this property,” said City Councilwoman Laura Chick, who recalled stepping over piles of glass and plaster rubble around the teetering building. “These were dark and dingy, small single and one-bedroom apartments, a long way from what we see today.”

The grand opening ceremony, held in the courtyard of the tan, Spanish-style complex, was also attended by Mayor Richard Riordan. He said the apartments are an example of “the Valley rising from the ashes.”

Rent at Coral Wood, at 8039 Reseda Blvd., is $521 for a one-bedroom unit, $623 for a two-bedroom and $714 for a three-bedroom. To be eligible for residency, families cannot earn more than 60% of the median income in the area.

Officials estimated average area rents at $705 for a two-bedroom unit and $850 for a three-bedroom.

After the quake, the Redevelopment Corp. pursued nearly 100 quake-damaged properties in the Valley, said Coral Wood project manager Cristina Agra-Hughes of the Ezralow Co.

“We wanted to pick up anything over 75 units,” she said.

One of the target properties was the Northridge Meadows Apartments, where 16 people died in the quake.

“We let it go when we found out how extensive the litigation was going to be,” she said.