Subject:  New Questions/Comments re Ice Rink, item 7A1 Aug 3
Date:  Sun, 02 Aug 2009 15:58:45 -0700
To:  bbogaard@cityofpasadena.net, Margaret McAustin <mmcaustin@cityofpasadena.net>, Jacque Robinson <jacquerobinson@cityofpasadena.net>, cholden@cityofpasadena.net, Steve Haderlein <shaderlein@cityofpasadena.net>, vgordo@cityofpasadena.net, ttornek@cityofpasadena.net, "Madison, Steve" <smadison@cityofpasadena.net>
CC:  "Jomsky, Mark" <mjomsky@cityofpasadena.net>, mbeck@cityofpasadena.net

Honorable Mayor and Councilmembers,

1. With this proposed ground lease arrangement, who is going to pay the tab for the traffic signal, the access road, the lease from Edison, and for bringing the utilities to the site?  The staff report says "The City would continue to secure agreements with PCC and SCE for access to the site and complete the infrastructure for the facility."

If those costs come out of the city taxpayer's pockets, then the ground lease deal also requires a bunch of up front investment from the city (in addition to the land).  The pull is just being shifted from one city accounting pocket to another.

2.  Who would own the building with such a ground lease arrangement?
What would happen at the end of the ground lease?
What would happen if PIV fails?
Can PIV sell the lease to another entity and what say would the city have in that?

3. If the profit of a new ice skating facility is going to be so great, why isn't there a corporation already chomping at the bit to purchase commercial land and build and run their own center?

Of course, no one wants to try to compete with a taxpayer funded and/or backed project.   It made some sense for the city to make a sweetheart deal to free up the civic center ballroom, but that excuse for using city resources has past.

Do/did the other commercial recreational rink facilities that have been used for comparison (Valencia, Toyota, Disney) rely on municipal freebies?  What are they?

Is it really necessary for the city to provide open space land and the access and utility improvements to make it commercially viable?  Land that is situated in such a way that there are tremendous additional costs for foundation, utilities, and access?  Of course any savvy business might jump at the chance to get those provided free or heavily subsidized.  If the city had realized the costs involved in using this parcel to begin with and other parcels were available as is happening now as a result of the economy, those costs would be put to better use to purchase land in a better location, somewhere that already has access, electricity, water, and sewer and is near other commercial establishments.

4.  A lot has been made of the "public benefit" piece.  But much of that is just good promotion policy.  Any smart business wants to get new people in to see and experience what they have to offer and hopefully get hooked.  It might be interesting to see what promotions are run by management at other ice rink facilities without being required to do so by a municipal contract.

5. What kind of development results when city land is leased for private development?  Which city permitting process is applicable?   If it would be a private development, why won't it need to go through the process required of private developments instead of the much more lax process it has been subjected to as a city development?

6.  Regarding the Edison lease.
      The staff report states: "In regard to SCE land required for access and overflow parking, staff is working with SCE on a long term lease. It is expected that the lease will include market rate compensation for the use of their property, which is included in the current operating pro forma."

    a. Staff may need to be reminded that if the SCE land is used for overflow parking, then the CUP needs to be revised.  (CUP condition 9.)
Putting overflow parking on the Edison land east of the facility would also make continuing avoidance of any public knowledge or scrutiny of the lease terms or the design of the access route and parking all the more aggravating.

    b. At the July 13 meeting, staff indicated the Pro Forma only included an old guesstimate of the cost of the Edison lease and and that Edison was performing a market rate study with results expected later that week.  Since the numbers in the pro forma provided for the August 3 agenda report are identical to that of July 13, but the staff report says the Edison market rate compensation is included in the pro forma, then they are saying their previous guesstimate was dead on?

7. One of the letters in the correspondence file, from a Stephen Jones, RCE, claims that the new facility "will hold 25 to 30 large weekend events per year.  Hockey alone will have around 8 tournaments each year that are 3 to 4 days long plus another 6 or 7 weekend events; figure skating events will hold another 12 to 14 events per year and then there is the daily visits by the users (approximately 400 per day)."

If this is true, it is completely out of line with the claims in the approved Environmental Initial Study which was used to support a "Negative Declaration with Mitigation Measures".   It claimed there would be major events at most once or twice per year on weekends.  From item 8.  Description of the Project (this language is also repeated in the CUP):
"As a condition of approval to the CUP for the Project, prior to the issuance of a building permit, the City and the Project’s operator shall be required to seek additional parking options and submit parking management and traffic control plans for major events, such as a sold out performance and a hockey tournament, anticipated to occur once or twice a year during the weekend."

Also, in the Initial Study, item 18 f: "Additional parking spaces may be needed to serve the Ice Rink at peak usage times, such as during a tournament or major event. Tournaments and other major events are expected to occur only once or twice per year. Thus, this limited exceedance of onsite parking is not considered a significant impact."

8.  The same letter sent to you says that all the families visiting the rink will bring lots of additional business to the city's hotels, restaurants, stores.  If the site were in a commercial area, especially closer to downtown Pasadena, this would be a lot more likely.  Located where it is, they are just as likely to hop on the freeway and go somewhere else.  East Pasadena doesn't have hotels, it has motels, and many of those aren't within the city limits and have dubious reputations.  East Pasadena has some restaurants, but they are well dispersed and for the most part visitors from out of town are going to find them hard to locate and/or their hours too limited.   Stores?  I suppose a few might be interested in taking advantage of being near the big box retailers of Hastings Village such as Best Buy, but there isn't much out on the town stuff out here.  There's not even a movie theater anymore.  They're more likely to go to Arcadia (which is what many east Pasadenans do in preference to dealing with traffic and parking in downtown Pasadena).


Thank you for your consideration,