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Friday, February 10, 2012
Council chooses two teams to revamp K Street
by Suzanne Hurt, published on July 13, 2010 at 11:16 PM
Storyline: K Street Mall
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In an upset vote, the Sacramento City Council on Tuesday chose two teams — one led by D & S Development, Inc. and CFY Development, Inc. and the other by Sacramento developer David Taylor — to revitalize two troubled blocks on K Street Mall.
In a split vote of 5 to 4, the council agreed to enter into an exclusive negotiating agreement with the teams endorsed by a selection committee to redevelop the 700 and 800 blocks of K Street. The majority of council members opted not to follow the recommendation of Mayor Kevin Johnson's ad hoc committee to give the entire project to the Sacramento Alliance Team, led by Rubicon Partners, St. Anton Partners and Preferred Capital Advisors.
"We need to be bold in our vision but also be realistic," said Councilman Kevin McCarty, who made the motion to approve those two teams.
Councilmembers Bonnie Pannell, Sandy Sheedy, Lauren Hammond and Robbie Waters mentioned developers' track records and the projects they thought could get done when they joined McCarty to approve D & S and CFY and their $35.5 million proposal to redevelop the 700 block. They also voted for Taylor and Z Gallerie owner Joe Zeiden to take on the 800 block with a proposed $46 million project.
The vote may have hinged on Waters and his detailed questions to all three development teams about construction schedules, public subsidies and other financing. Under Water's’ questioning, Taylor said he has nine months to a year to use roughly $20 million in redevelopment funds remaining from the city's $130 million sale of the Sheraton Hotel to Taylor.
"I supported every ambitious project downtown," Pannell said, referring to her time on the council. "Tonight, I can only support the project I think is gonna get done."
The council's decision followed an hour of public comment from about 30 people on the issue. Residents, preservationists, local business owners and labor union representatives overwhelmingly spoke out in favor of the two teams and their proposals, which were described as "safe" and "financially realistic" plans to build housing and primarily homegrown live music venues and retail by restoring historic buildings on $40 million in city-owned land.
Bill Burg, preservation chair of the Sacramento Old City Association, pushed for the two teams and their proposals to preserve the city's "existing urban fabric" rather than demolishing landmarks to build something else.
"Instead of revinventing K Street again, we can reconnect K Street to downtown Sacramento," he said.
Waters and other council members said they were concerned about the financing for the Sacramento Alliance Team's $210 million proposal. That plan was built around a 32,500-square-foot public market, tentatively called the California Boqueria, an adjacent office building, 213 artist live/work units and 75,000 square feet.
The negotiating phase is expected to take up to six months, according to city staff.
Just before the vote, Johnson said he may have made a mistake in asking the council in May to approve an ad hoc committee after the city's selection committee had already recommended developers for K Street Mall.
"I think the process feels a little fishy. And I need to acknowledge that," he said. "The intent was not to create this dynamic. I would agree that I think we could do this much better."
Johnson recommended the council reevaluate how it uses ad hoc committees in the future. But he said he appreciated the way the council and the community respectfully debated the issue and the proposals.
"This to me was a great discussion," he said.
Photos by Brandon Darnell. Suzanne Hurt is a staff reporter for The Sacramento Press.
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Agreed Cee Cee. same here... no communication on this or any other matter from my councilman, Rob Fong. Here is a guy that will never answer and email, hold a community meeting or communicate in any way with his constituents.
He does show up to quaff wine at the Taste of Land Park each year, but this is not exactly community outreach.
There may be some good reasons for the ad hoc committee to support the Rubicon solution, but the public will never know as long as we have these mute incumbents around.
Memorial Auditorium is well-suited for a 1000-1500 capacity concert, or larger. The Crest works in the 600-1000 capacity range, and the Community Center theater is right in the range you're talking about. It's that middle range where we have a venue gap.
Burg has no idea of what he is talking about; the Memorial Auditorium and the Crest are not dedicated clubs, which is why they are not the right venues for live performances. I have seen shows at both, BOTH of the venues suck - Neither the Crest or the Memorial Auditorium can do shows on any day of the week - Neither the Crest or the Memorial Auditorium are self sustaining - neither would not exist unless they were heavily or fully subsidized. A large club could be self sustaining, have shows on any night of the week and more importantly make enough profit to pay back the tax payers - A 500 seat club is not large enough to be self sustaining, it cannot survive without indefinite subsidies.
The single best way to revitalize K Street is to build a 1000+ capacity anchor venue like the Catalyst on Pacific Avenue in Santa Cruz. I suggest that Burg and the Taylor cronies visit Santa Cruz.
http://www.catalystclub.com Check out the band list and see who has played there - the list is amazing.
But hey, I can't wait to see the opening of Taylor's $10+ million dollar publicly funded Cougar bar and pizzeria...
Good to hear though our money is at work - no doubt the cougars need a place to hunt.
http://callenostalgia.blogspot.com/2008/12/nirvana-live-at-cattle-club-1990-video.html
The last time Ministry came through town (with the Revolting Cocks) they played at the Crest--so did the Creatures and John Cale. Proximity to SF has some to do with it, but a lot of bands that play SF also play the Sacramento area, they just wind up at the Boardwalk because there aren't enough Sacramento city venues of similar capacity.
And plenty of other bands and musicians have played there. I'm not sure what the "any day of the week" comment is in reference to - but the Crest can and does host musical acts on assorted days. If enough were coming through town, they could do it on an almost daily basis and still operate as an art house movie theater in the downstairs screens with a separate entrance and separate concessions and bathrooms. And it's a good venue with no obstructed seats and an unusual sense of intimacy for a 975 seat auditorium.
I think a big "I told you so is in order." I have been predicting this outcome since the process began.
Despite the dog and pony show of the Councils "sub-committee" supporting the Rubicon project, I knew it was all for show - there was no possibility that anyone but David Taylor et. al. were going to get this project. This project is the remnants of Taylor's Sheraton swindle.
Johnson's quote is priceless - ""I think the process feels a little fishy...” lol, gee you think?
Corruption in River City at its finest. No doubt Taylor and his fat cat insider buddies are sat around, had a fat $100 stogie and laughed it up over this one.
The "ad-hoc" committe was made up of ELECTED council members - ELECTED Council members ALWAYS trump city staff. We elected council members, not City staff.
Not that I'm a proponant of any of the proposals on K Street, I am against all of them - I believe that the tax payers have already been forced to spend hundreds of millions to revitalize K Street and all of these efforts have failed. SHRA needs to stay off K Street and focus on places like Oak Park and Del Paso Heights - If left alone the free market could have solved the problems on K Street long ago.
I think the idea of a medium-sized venue along K Street is fantastic...as long as it doesn't fall into the same peril as the former Empire Events center, which at one point had some great bands coming through, then somehow turned into a hip-hop/top-40, tacky club; where the likes of "girls gone wild" could come through (and yes, that franchise did stop through).
I think the Council made a forward-thinking, yet pragmatic choice!!
P.S. I’ve played the Catalyst. It’s a great club that has an 800 capacity.
P.S. S. If you are worried that its too small to fit Dave Matthews, I wouldn’t book him anyway
In my opinion we've lacked a decent mid sized music venue since we lost the Cattle Club.
It looks like your club will be exactly what Sacramento's live music lovers have been doing without.
A larger club would be a regional draw. A larger club should not be intended to be a place for local bands to play, they have smaller local clubs to play, unless of course they could draw the crowds - think Cake in the early 90's.
A semi modular club, with the capacity to do 1000+ shows, patterned after the Catalyst, hell if I were you I would seriously consider partnering with them and call the place the Catalyst - Sacramento - You could both share acts when they swing through your areas. The Catalyst has been in business for 35-40 years - I can’t name one club of 300-500 capacity that has been in business anything close to that. Santa Cruz is a MUCH smaller market as well - yet still brings them in and is a regional draw - why? Because of the quality of the acts.
"Randall Kane created what is arguably the most impressive club venue on the planet," said Tom Miller, concert programmer for Don Quixote's International Music Hall in Felton. "I'd be surprised if any other club could create a list of bands equal to what The Catalyst has booked over the years."
When agents and tour promoters are looking for venues, the first things they look are most often the region, then capacity, reputation and so on down the line - a larger club allows to draw more and better bands - it's that simple - this will always be a fact.
The Catalyst can hold up to 1200, I've seen it and verified the ticket sales - They are known as a 1000 club, I'm not positive of the legal capacity - to be honest, most club owners ignore the legal capacity when it comes to cramming people in for a show.
Bravo!
Jim, at the heart of the matter, it doesn't seem like you really disagree with Jason. His belief is that a large venue would be a much bigger risk than a medium venue -- which to me, seems obvious. Your argument is that a larger venue would have greater potential -- which to me, again, seems obvious. More potential v more risk.
Given the regions repeated failures, seems like the safer bet is the smarter bet in this instance.
Just FYI, P.S. = Post Script
You're going to want to add another post, not another script ...
Gee besides that...what keeps them from being a 1000+ capacity venue/club?
"Burg has no idea of what he is talking about; the Memorial Auditorium and the Crest are not dedicated clubs, which is why they are not the right venues for live performances. I have seen shows at both, BOTH of the venues suck"
I love the Crest - It's just not the same as a large club
They can do events on a nightly basis and still show movies on a nightly basis. If your argument is against it for not having a club layout/atmosphere, fine it isn't a club. But it's not a valid argument to say that they can't accommodate music/events and also show movies as they do this all the time and are specifically designed to do so.
The Crest has been the underrated champion of K Street for years, through thick and thin (and more thin than thick). A few years ago, the 10th Street block didn't look that much better then the 7th-9th street blocks and the Crest has been a beacon of hope the entire time.
However, I can't help but think about the 700 block five years ago and before when it already had a live venue (Junta), and was entirely full of local businesses. Now, 80 million dollars later we have: (drum-roll) a live music venue and local businesses. But I am glad the buildings are getting rehabbed rather than torn down.
K Street is moving forward. This is a time to keep it on track and watch it grow, not trash talk it, personally attack people who are doing the hard work, or talk about what is SHOULD be like in a perfect world. Just my opinion.
I will always "trash talk" the forced public funding of private ventures for insider developers.
And what hard work are you speaking of? Being well connected and making millions off the tax payers...
As for my mistake on the Cougar bar, I have already said that I have been watching the wrong parcel - But honestly, I avoid K Street like the plague. I will not support K Street, because I do not support Redevelopment or the use of emenent domain to seize property and give it to well connected developers. I also fear going downtown because of the very heavy handed parking ticketing.
The main dance hall is 5000 square feet, not including balconies, and can hold 800 people.
The bar downstairs is 100 feet long, starting in the front room and extending into the concert area. A large selection of beer and liquor is offered here.
Upstairs is the game room with another bar, 6 pool tables a jukebox and arcade games, as well as a lounge."
http://www.catalystclub.com/
While, I oppose the use of public money for the project, it is a done deal. I hope that you are very successful, no doubt Sacramento desperately needs a new venue. Now Sacramento has the rare opportunity to build one - If you can build a place anything like the Catalyst you will be successful. Maybe you could take the D&S, CFY guys and Taylor on a trip to Santa Cruz to see a show, there is a Hayride to Hell, Motorpunx and Swillbillie show coming up in August - or to the Ted Nugent show on the 19th.
Historic preservation and lively cultural amenities work hand in hand. There are few cities better known for their music scene than Austin, and the cover story of the latest issue of Preservation Magazine ( http://www.preservationnation.org/magazine/ ) is focused on Austin's South Congress district, a strip of historic buildings that showcases Austin's independent business and individualistic character. From that article:
'The landmark to look for is the Ausitn Motel, a spiffed-up classic of the American West. A message at the bottom of the red neon sign out front reads, "So close yet so far out," and the other side says, "No additives, no preservatives, corporate free since 1938."'
This strip of buildings, located at the heart of Austin, went through plenty of rough times but came back without requiring revitalization via demolition, and without requiring a big corporate anchor to weigh them down. They are also the home of a very popular live music venue, the Continental Club--a long-lasting and successful live music club with a maximum capacity of 200.
Public money should not be subsidizing private investment.
-No bank bailouts.
-No public-funded basketball arena.
-No freaking "boqueria", or anything else.
The above are all examples of poltical favors & cronyism, as special-interests & developers try to raid the coffers of public funds... so they don't risk anything themselves & therefore, don't have to come up with a smart or feasible idea. They just need to put up some pretty powerpoint slides with pictures of people walking on K Street, and abuse buzzwords like "green" and "living spaces"... in order to convice the Silly Council to give them money.
All these things worsen our debt & our tax burden. This type of leadership inevitably makes Sacramento a worse place to live as a result.
"Revitalizing" downtown is such a pointless effort. Downtown Sacramento has sold it's soul to the devil years ago, by becoming the state capital. Just look around at the monolithic concrete jungle. That's why K ST sucks! The City Council constantly debates "How can we get suburbanites to drive downtown?" Answer: They can't, wont, never will. Dense urban housing is the only thing that will improve downtown, and it will only happen over time on it's own if you let it. CA government needs to shrink, which will debase property values downtown, and once make investment reasonable there. That's what makes towns like Chico & Davis nice communities.
For the majority of Sacramentans, the government has become the answer to everything - to solve all of our problems. Well, the natural rise and fall of urban cores in City's throughout the nation, a problem CAUSED by government policies, cannot be solved by simply throwing money at the problem. Or is it really even a problem? Why is it necessary to force tax payers to pay corporate welfare recipients to set up shop? It's not. If it had been left alone, K Street would be much better off than it is now.
As for the project costing $100+ million you are correct. When it is all added up, the cost of the land, the cost of buying out the previous owners, the legal fees for using in eminent domain, the parking facility, the infrastructure, the construction costs, tax breaks etc etc... This project will cost the tax payers in excess of $100 million, despite what anyone will admit.
But does it really matter? We can complain all we want, the government is going to do what the government is going to do, tax payers be damned, and that will never change.
The deciding vote was cast by Robbie Waters, the council's one Republican, based on the economics of the proposals. The frugal, fiscally conservative proposal won the day, and the risky, spend like there's no tomorrow proposal lost, and you still aren't happy? I guess there's no pleasing some people.
Not that complicated really.
I saw Brewster's Millions. This is like KJ's Millions... no one is forcing anyone to spend tens of millions of tax dollars. It doesn't grow on trees, so *yes*, it IS debt.
Not to be a spelling nudzh or a dick or anything, but it's Tipitina's, not Tipatina's. As for great venues, not sure what will get people downtown. I do know that the city will need to curtail the aggressions of its army of ticket-writing revenue generators, because that army will drive people away from coming downtown before something can get going. And with the budget cuts, light rail isn't running after 9 p.m., so how are people going to get back and forth without cars. Hey, let's have a music venue geared expressly toward fixed-gear bike snobs!
Anyway, given the mention of the Catalyst and Tipitina's, and Antone's, it sounds like some people would like to bring something along the lines of the old Palms Playhouse in Davis (one of the best venues this particular graybeard music fan ever enjoyed). The reality is that when the Palms did the math after it got displaced from its Davis site, it elected to relocate in Winters to draw more people from the Bay Area and other areas toward the north coast. What Sacramento doesn't need is another venue geared to attract grizzled blues fans in their 50s; what our city does need is a room that, first, is all-ages accessible to encourage younger fans, and second, makes a point of encouraging and supporting emerging local talent, while smartly booking those acts with better known west coast or national (or even international) acts. We need to grow the scene here, or else young would-be live music fans are going to continue to opt for dance clubs instead.
Which is to say that Jerry Perry should be included in this conversation, as I'd guess he'd have something pretty smart to say here. As would a lot of other people I know who I'm guessing avoid Sacramento Press like the plague.
Anyway, I'm so glad that wine snob Boqueria idea got shot down. Dumb, dumb, dumb, that one was.
One of my fondest memories of Sacramento is watching you play at the last Stucco Factory party with Bobby Burns - ah those were the good ol' days.
Jason Boggs would be well served by talking to both you and Jerry Perry.
1. Much of tax dollars from the Sheraton Hotel sale, Taylor is using on this mediocre project he was required to use on K Street. So if the council had chosen another developer, Taylor would have had to develop another project on K Street to use those funds. So instead of leveraging the funds for another K Street project they wasted it on this one.
2. Councilwoman Sheedy states that these projects are catalysts that will ensure K Street remains a focal point of activity. In fact these fussed up strip mall developments have guaranteed that the uban center will be the Railyards. K Street will in the end be rather sad.
The decision by this council who were more concerned that they were not part of the Mayor's ad hoc committee than anything else has made a decision akin to the city Council that approved the cement 'sculptures' on K Street. We later spent a million or so tearing out them out. I wonder if we will be doing the same thing with these tilt-up projects.
Around the corner from my apartment, there will be another R-street corridor with children of the Shady Lady. This squanders a valuable opportunity to complete the central downtown community with a market in favor of things I can already take advantage of elsewhere.
Furthermore, the supported development casts aside the Sacramento Blueprint's vision for sustainable communities celebrated in this article from the Wall Street Journal: http://ow.ly/2bFTy. I would urge the council complete the community by directing D&S to add an urban market to its proposal. The K street neighborhood will not be complete without it and a market that may or may not be part of the Railyards project (wherever and whenever that gets built) will not suffice. The residential neighborhood of K street needs to be its own unit.
As a resident unpaid by any developer, I agree with Rhys02 assessment that this decision will move the center of the neighborhood away from K street and to the Railyards, putting the all important essential, a grocery market, nearly a mile away -- little better than the current state of affairs. This step, by a developer who has yet to use funds he was given several years ago by the city, at best marks time. At worst it is a step backward and squanders the long-term rewards the city could reap by having a complete community.
While the D&S/David Taylor/CFY proposal may or may not yield immediate results, those results pale in comparison
I'm trying to do the responsible thing living downtown sustainably and commuting to work on light rail, thereby limiting my carbon footprint. But the lack of a market with basic, fresh and healthy meat and produce costs me considerable and valuable time, which I consider more important than money.
As a result of the city council's vote on Tuesday, unless it adds a market to the David Taylor/D&S/CFY, I will likely move back to Folsom or to another city all together.
Tuesday was a sad day for the great city I have called home for much of my 27 years. I love Sacramento and the possibility to living downtown without a car is exciting and liberating and something I had planned to do for the rest of my life. Now, as a result of this decision, I fear I will have to buy a car wasting money on insurance and gas, which, I could spend far more wisely in other areas of the community, or move out of the community altogether.
Lastly, Councilwoman Sheedy's comments about Napa's Copia project sounded utterly backward and confused. She couldn't even remember the name of its backers, the Mondavi's, who are at least as important to the region as the Greek developers in the area. The Boqueria California is definitely not the same thing. For one, it would be in an urban area where it would service local residents in addition to tourists and be an asset to the region and reason to live downtown. I could go on, but I'm getting long-winded
Despite your accusation, the selected proposal does a better job of meeting the requirements of the Blueprint than the Rubicon project--it adds housing in considerable quantity, and does so as part of an integrated neighborhood based on walkability and local neighborhood needs, while the Boqueria's housing component took a serious back seat to the car-centric, parking-centric, suburban resident-centric aspects like the "Boqueria" tourist attraction, the hotel, and the office tower (the last two of which were barely even mentioned.) They are also greener because they reuse existing building, saving the embodied energy of the building, requiring less new material for construction, and resulting in far less construction and demolition waste in landfills. That's real green policy--not greenwashing.
And if the farmer's market is in the Railyards, so what? There's a light rail station on the corner of 8th and K, and the Green Line (already under construction) will go straight there. The Railyards covers an area nearly 100 times the project area of the 800 block--240 acres--and is expected to have as many as 10,000 housing units. I consider it highly unlikely that a project covering 1% of the space should be expected to compete with that, nor should it--the Railyards is a long-term project that is well underway (the money is being spent and work is being done!), and sabotaging it with competing proposals ripping off their ideas a mile away is utterly unnecessary and counterproductive.
Maybe for a 27 year old you are particularly uninterested in the kind of bands that currently end up going to the Boardwalk instead of playing in downtown Sacramento. But that's exactly the kind of venue that the Shady Lady wants to put on K Street, but without the 20 mile drive out to Orangevale (for those with cars, anyhow.) It's just the sort of thing the central city is entirely missing. A "Knitting Factory" venue would have had to depend on non-local acts "safe" enough to be able to fill a 2000-seat hall (assuming they could have shrunk people down enough to fit 2000 people in a building that never could have handled that capacity) assuming they were able to stay open at all--several Knitting Factory locations have closed down and reopened with smaller 300-400 capacity venues because their larger sites in Los Angeles and New York proved unsustainable!
In the meantime if you live downtown and already ride light rail to work, I assume you have a monthly pass and are suitably comfortable with public transit. Get one of those little rolling carts, hop on the light rail with it, and take light rail to Safeway (2 blocks from the 16th Street light rail station) or the Co-Op (1 block from the 29th Street station) or Trader Joe's (3 blocks from the 48th Street light rail station), do your shopping, put your food in the cart and ride home. Or just stop there on your way to or from work--pack a couple reusable shopping bags to work. That's what I do.
Also, I'm not sure I understand your use of the phrase "Greek developers", but it seems slightly xenophobic and more than slightly offensive.
Example, more or less recently I’ve seen the Sun Ra Arkestra in a piece of crap café, Janelle Monae in a bar no larger than Badlands, Betty Lavette in a barn, Damn Funk in a nightclub, Peaches in a park, Gill Scott Heron in a theater ESG in a dissused strip club etc etc etc . Sacramento has all those, barns, cafes, nightclubs, parks etc etc etc - so I don’t think it’s a lack of venues…. Of course, im in no way against more venues, bring it on!