Who doesn't like parks? Especially these days, with so many of us thinking "green."
So what's better than a park?
Two parks.
Why this simple math lesson?
Because it might be that our city officials could have secured land for two parks at the same price they now propose to pay for one.
That can't be said for certain — not at this point, anyway — because city officials have yet to fully explain how they came to offer $5.6 million for a 0.8-acre parcel of land for a park on the 400 block of S. Spring Street.
The answers are coming slowly. They're still not adding up, though, and the deal is heading toward escrow.
The fuzzy math started with an announcement in mid-January, highlighted by a strange reference that 9th District Los Angeles City Councilmember Jan Perry made to the $5.6 million price tag. Perry called it a bargain price because it's 12.5% below the appraised value in September of 2008.
Perhaps the reference amounted to an attempt by Perry to say that she understood that an economic earthquake struck the entire U.S. in September. She left that open to interpretation, though, with no specific acknowledgment of the steep downturn in the real estate market since September. Or the massive job losses. Or the wave of foreclosures.
It turns out that even the ill-defined reference to September didn't tell the whole story. Sure, someone might have performed an appraisal in September. But the comparable sales used as the basis for the $5.6 million price for the parcel of land on Spring Street had nothing to do with September. They occurred between November of 2006 and July of 2008, we later learned.
That gives us a price based on an appraisal that overlooks the latest declines of the real estate market and the economy in general — and last five months, in particular, have brought the shakiest economic performance our nation has seen in 80 years. Yet the price for the park land is based, instead, on the good old days for Downtown's real estate market. Downtown remained plenty hot in November of 2006 and into 2007, after all. The U.S. didn't enter recession until the end of 2007, according to the federal government. As recently as June of 2008 a panel of high-profile Downtown real estate developers — gathered under the banner of the Central City Association — left the impression that the basics of the local real estate market were just fine.
That last part turned out to be about as far off the mark as possible.
It appears, however, that city officials are nonetheless willing to pay $5.6 million for the land on Spring Street based on those earlier days of a booming real estate market and the sort of discredited sales pitch that kept coming right up until the fall.
Here's the kicker on this whole deal: It also appears that the city and the developer's bank used the same appraiser to determine the value of the land on Spring Street, a rather cozy agreement with $5.6 million of the public's money on the line.
This is all important in and of itself, but also because of the window it offers on how the city does business with special interests.
There appears to be plenty in this deal for the developer and the bank — and not much effort expended on behalf of the public's interest. There are too many questions and not enough sound answers. The public first heard about this deal in a way that was clumsy at best and deceptive at worst — and we've heard too little since.
This looks like the sort of dealings that are threatening our very way of life, undermining what little trust is left between government and the governed amid the most severe economic circumstances in several generations.
We can live with this and watch our economy and our way of life continue to slip away.
Or we can let the politicians, bankers, and real estate developers know that our world has changed dramatically in just the past few months — and it's time for them to make some changes, too.
Jerry Sullivan is editor of L.A. Garment & Citizen.
Photo of South Spring Street in Downtown L.A. from Google Maps
Related Article:
How Much is Too Much for Inner-City Park Land?
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