L.A. Convention Center expansion hits a wall: Council committee endorses repairs instead
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- A City Council committee voted 3 to 2 to recommend repairs to the Convention Center, with members saying a $2.7-billion expansion is too risky.
- Both the repair proposal and the expansion plan head to the full council for a vote Friday.
- Supporters say the expansion would create thousands of jobs and give downtown a much-needed boost.
A $2.7-billion plan to expand the Los Angeles Convention Center is in jeopardy after a narrowly divided City Council committee has opted to recommend a much smaller package of repairs instead.
Amid mounting concerns that the expansion could siphon money away from basic city services, the Budget and Finance Committee voted 3 to 2 on Tuesday to begin work on a less expensive package of upgrades that would be completed in time for the 2028 Olympic Games — and formally halt the current effort to expand the facility.
Councilmember Katy Yaroslavsky said the expansion proposal — which would add an estimated 325,000 square feet to the facility, spanning both sides of Pico Boulevard — is too risky for the city, both in terms of the tight construction timeline and the overall cost.
“The risks to the city’s finances are too great — and risks us having to cut our city workforce to offset the costs of this project for years to come,” said Yaroslavsky, who heads the committee.
Yaroslavsky proposed the less expensive alternative plan, drawing “yes” votes from Councilmembers Bob Blumenfield and Eunisses Hernandez. Councilmembers Tim McOsker and Heather Hutt voted against the proposal, saying it was a sudden and huge departure from the original expansion plan.
“I’m not comfortable voting on these recommendations today,” Hutt said. “The substantive changes have not been circulated to the committee members, staff and public — and the public hasn’t been able to give public comment on these last-minute changes that are very significant.”
Both proposals — the expansion and the less expensive package of repairs and upgrades — are set to go before the full City Council on Friday.
Council members have spent the last year trying to find a way to expand the size of the Convention Center, doubling the amount of contiguous meeting space, without also creating an excessive burden on an already stretched city budget. They have received increasingly dire warnings as Friday’s deadline for making a decision approaches.
Despite cost-cutting efforts, the tab for expanding the facility has gone up again, reaching $2.7 billion — an increase of $483 million from six months ago.
Chief Legislative Analyst Sharon Tso, who advises the council on policy matters, told the committee Wednesday that she fears the project’s first phase won’t be done in time for the 2028 Games, when the Convention Center will host several competitions, including judo, wrestling and fencing.
Tso also warned that the ongoing cost of the project would make it much more difficult for the city to hire more firefighters, recruit more police officers and pay for such basic services as street repairs. Four months ago, the council approved a budget that closed a $1-billion financial gap, requiring cuts to city personnel.
“We just completed a budget process that was very brutal,” she said. “If you’re happy with the level of service that we have today, then this is the project for you.”
At City Hall, the Convention Center is widely viewed as a facility in need of serious repair, including new elevators and escalators, up-to-date restrooms and overall cosmetic upgrades. Failing to expand the Convention Center, and giving up a chance to attract large national events, is “an equally expensive gamble,” Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson wrote in an op-ed published Wednesday in the Westside Current.
“Ignoring the project would mean continuing to hemorrhage events to other cities, forgoing the tax revenues and job creation they bring,” he wrote. “The civic math is simple. The project is shockingly expensive, but neglect is potentially even more costly.”
The project, if approved, would connect the Convention Center’s South Hall — whose curving green exterior faces the 10 and 110 Freeway interchange — with the West Hall, which is a faded blue.
The council already has pushed for several cost-cutting measures, including the removal of a plaza planned on Figueroa Street. Mayor Karen Bass and the council also have hoped to generate new revenue by installing digital billboards — two of them near the interchange.
Even with the freeway-facing digital signs, the cost of expanding and operating the Convention Center could reach $160 million in 2031, according to City Administrative Officer Matt Szabo, a high-level budget analyst.
The cost to taxpayers is expected to average about $100 million per year over three decades, according to updated figures prepared by Szabo. The annual cost would peak in the first decade, exceeding $130 million from 2031 to 2040.
The Convention Center expansion has become a top priority for business groups, labor leaders and community organizations who say that downtown L.A. desperately needs an economic catalyst — one that will create thousands of construction jobs and spark new business activity.
After the pandemic emergency, office workers never fully returned to downtown, and dozens of stores and restaurants shut their doors. Homelessness and drug addiction also continue to plague portions of downtown.
“We want to see downtown recover. We want it to be a place Angelenos can be proud of, and this is the solution,” Cassy Horton, co-founder of the DTLA Residents Assn., said at the committee hearing.
Labor and business leaders told the council members that the city has a long track record of developing plans for upgrading the Convention Center, only to shelve them once it’s time for a decision.
With Olympic events planned at the Convention Center, city leaders want to use the Games as an impetus for construction that could ultimately cost billions.
“For more than a decade, we’ve studied this project, we’ve debated it, we’ve delayed it,” said Nella McOsker, president and chief executive of the Central City Assn., a downtown-based business group. “We’ve been deciding whether or not we are a city that can maintain and invest in this essential asset, and every time we make that delay, the cost increases.”
McOsker is the daughter of Councilmember Tim McOsker, who voted “no” on the repair proposal. An outspoken supporter of the expansion, he argued that the city took on a similar financial burden 30 years ago when it financed the construction of the Convention Center’s South Hall.
Yaroslavsky, in turn, said she was concerned not just about the project’s cost but also the potential for it to pull resources away from the Department of Water and Power.
Dave Hanson, senior assistant general manager for the DWP’s power system, told the committee that deploying his workers at the Convention Center could result in delays on utility work elsewhere, including a San Fernando Valley light-rail project and the installation of underground power lines in fire-devastated Pacific Palisades.
“DWP may — we don’t know for sure yet, because they don’t know for sure yet — may have to sideline other critically important projects, including reconstructing the Palisades and all these other projects,” said Yaroslavsky, who represents part of the Westside.
Yaroslavsky’s alternative plan calls for the city to request new proposals for expanding the Convention Center, while also looking at other strategies to “maximize the site’s positive economic impacts.”
Hernandez, whose district includes part of the Eastside, said council members remain open to the idea of the Convention Center expansion as the project heads to a final vote.
“So it’s not that we’ve ruled out any options,” she said. “We’ve added more options to the conversation.”
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