Cracking The Code
By Ryan Vaillancourt, Los Angeles Downtown News
Everyone knows that getting a construction project approved in Los Angeles is a difficult and often maddening task. Land-use professionals even have a name for the expensive, time consuming trip as they tote blueprints and other materials from counter to counter at the departments of Building and Safety, Planning, Water and Power and others: They call it the Suitcase Tour of Los Angeles. Read entire article

The 42 Most Powerful People in Downtown
By Jon Regardie, Los Angeles Downtown News
Power is often amorphous, something you can recognize more than touch. Anyone who has spent a few years in Downtown Los Angeles has a good sense of who’s got juice. Read entire article

Los Angeles Eiminating Red Tape
By Angelica Pappas, The Restaurant Standard
Navigating the typically nightmarish process of opening a new restaurant is a nearly universal experience for operators in any city. In Los Angeles, the journey to opening day was notoriously arduous. But once the Central City Association (CCA) of Los Angeles launched a concerted effort to address the problems, the local government agencies involved took notice and sprang to action. The resulting Los Angeles Restaurant and Hospitality Express Program created real change for restaurants looking to operate in the city. Read entire article

Will Teamwork Work for L.A.?
By Howard Fine, LA Business Journal
When Los Angeles Deputy Mayor Austin Beutner this summer jettisoned the so-called 12-to-two plan to streamline the building permit process, he told developers not to worry: He’d be even more ambitious about cutting the city’s notorious red tape. Read entire article

Trying to Save Fifth and Flower
By Ryan Vaillancourt, Los Angeles Downtown News
DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES - A group of Financial District stakeholders led by the Central City Association is mobilizing to challenge the recent Metro board decision to eliminate the Fifth and Flower streets station from the Downtown Regional Connector. Read entire article

Downtown 2020: Heavy Hitters Discuss the Future of Downtown LA
By Ryan Vaillancourt, Los Angeles Downtown News
When Downtown's most influential powerbrokers peered into a crystal ball this morning, they summoned a vision of Los Angeles in the year 2020. They saw millions of people navigating a cleaner, denser and more pedestrian-friendly urban fabric via bicycle, light rail, streetcar, subway and bus. Read entire article

Grand Avenue project faces 2-year delay over funding
By Kate Linthicum, Los Angeles Times
The developer of the $3-billion hotel, condo and retail development plans to request an extension on its February 2011 deadline and may seek another if the economy doesn't improve. Read entire article

L.A. officials launch campaign to roll back state environmental rule
By Patrick McGreevy and David Zahniser, Los Angeles Times
A bill in the Legislature would delay new regulations that require the DWP to overhaul three coastal power plants to reduce the amount of seawater used for cooling. Read entire article

L.A. program aims to make parking easier
By Martha Groves, Los Angeles Times
The yearlong ExpressPark program will use new meters and pavement sensors to keep track of parked vehicles. Eventually, signs will guide drivers to empty spaces in city garages and lots. Read entire article

Eli Broad's museum OK'd by supervisors, making it virtually a done deal
Los Angeles Times
While Eli Broad's downtown museum still needs one more agency's approval before it gets its official green light, Tuesday's 5-0 approval by the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors means that it is more or less a sure thing.Read entire article

LA supervisors OK proposed downtown LA Broad museum
KPCC
The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors today endorsed a plan to build a downtown museum to house Eli and Edythe Broad's contemporary art collection as part of the Grand Avenue Project.Read entire article

Villaraigosa picks former Paramount executive to lead redevelopment agency
By David Zahniser, Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has selected Christine Essel, a former entertainment industry executive who recently lost a bruising campaign for City Council, to serve as his top executive at the L.A. Community Redevelopment Agency, officials said Tuesday. Read entire article

L.A. businesses want crackdown on illegal signs, not new rules
By Howard Fine, Los Angeles Business Journal
Businesses and sign companies are fighting back against tough proposed regulations the city of Los Angeles is considering for storefront and pole signs that they depend on to lure customers. Read entire article

Express program will make it easier for those opening restaurants, bars.
By Staff and Wire Services, dailynews.com
Recognizing that small businesses need help recovering from the recession, city officials on Thursday announced a streamlined permitting process that will make it easier to open a restaurant or bar in Los Angeles. Read entire article

L.A. Seeks to Streamline Permitting
By Howard Fine, Los Angeles Business Journal
Los Angeles city officials on Thursday unveiled a program to speed up permits for new restaurants, bars and grocery stores.Read entire article

A New Order for Restaurant Permitting
Streamlined Approval Process Aims to Shave Opening Times in Half
By Ryan Vaillancourt, losangelesdowntownnews.com
Hundreds if not thousands of entrepreneurs have opened, or tried to open, restaurants or bars in Los Angeles in recent years. While those venues range from chic nightclubs to old-fashioned diner-style eateries, each of them has one thing in common: Horror stories from the permitting process. Read entire article

At the Center of It All
Carol Schatz Hits Two Decades of Growing Downtown at the Central City Association
By Jon Regardie, Executive Editor, losangelesdowntownnews.com
Carol Schatz joined the Central City Association on July 2, 1990. At the time, Downtown Los Angeles was a 9-to-5 community facing the start of a recession and an exodus of Fortune 500 companies. By the time Schatz became president and CEO five years later, the CCA claimed fewer than 100 members and had a budget of $750,000. Its cash reserves were at about $30,000. Read entire article

Medallion's Double Gamble
Historic Core Project Looks for Two Types Of Tenants to Fill 85,000 Square Feet of Retail Space
By Richard Guzmán, losangelesdowntownnews.com
With a small private street flanked by empty storefronts, idle escalators and a noticeable lull in Downtown noise, Saeed Farkhondepour’s mixed-use Medallion project looks almost like a ghost town. Read entire article

Blogging goes to print in Downtown Los Angeles with blogdowntown Weekly
By blogdowntown Staff
After five years as the essential online source for Downtown Los Angeles’ news and information, blogdowntown.com announces plans to roll out a weekly print edition of the “go-to site” for all things downtown Los Angeles. On the morning of Thursday, August 5, 2010, blogdowntown Weekly will hit the stands for the first time, packed with a comprehensive events calendar and features covering nightlife, culture, food, fashion, news and entertainment specific to the neighborhood. Read entire article

Everybody's Crazy About a Sharp-Dressed Schatz
By Charles Crumpley, David Haldane, Joel Russell, labusinessjournal.com
Carol Schatz is known as a woman who can fight. And she was recognized with a resolution from the Los Angeles City Council on July 23 on her 20th anniversary of fighting on behalf of downtown interests, mainly businesses. Read entire article

LA's 'Job Czar' boasts a broad portfolio at City Hall
By Phil Willon, latimes.com
The Wall Street millionaire tapped by Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa to be the city's "job czar" has, in just three months, turned into a kind of behind-the-scenes fixer for an administration singed by an escalating budget crisis and political upheaval over a hike in utility bills. Read entire article

Business in Dark On DWP Hikes
By Howard Fine and Alfred Lee, Los Angeles Business Journal
L.A. businesses are worried that the highly publicized fight over power rate hikes between the mayor and the City Council is prolonging uncertainty surrounding the cost of power, making it harder for them to budget. Read entire article

Business Leaders Hope to Zap DWP Rate Hikes
by Howard Fine, Los Angeles Business Journal
Businesses in the city of Los Angeles are alarmed at the prospect of being slammed with increases of up to 26 percent on their power bills with little warning under Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s recent proposal for a carbon surcharge. Read entire article

The Ovrom Factor: How the New Building and Safety Chief Plans to Run One of the City’s Most Important Departments
by Ryan Vaillancourt, Los Angeles Downtown News
Bud Ovrom, the still newly minted head of the city Department of Building and Safety, is the first to admit he has no background in engineering and construction safety. So shortly after taking the post, he bought two books to add to the mini-library in his 10th floor corner office at 201 N. Figueroa St.: Why Buildings Stand Up, and its companion, Why Buildings Fall Down, by structural engineers Matthys Levy and Mario Salvadori. Read entire article

L.A. city retirements threaten a deep and lasting legacy
by David Zahniser, latimes.com
The exodus of employees approved to ease budget problems will drain the workforce of many experienced people and leave Los Angeles officials hampered in hiring replacements until 2024. Read entire article

Redevelopment Agency to Leave Historic Core
by Anna Scott, Los Angeles Downtown News
The Community Redevelopment Agency's long history of being headquartered in the heart of Downtown is coming to an end.

The CRA Board of Commissioners today approved a plan for the agency to leave its nearly 30-year home at the Banco Popular Center on Spring Street for the Garland Center, a largely city government-occupied building in City West. Read entire article

What's Next for Parker Center?
by Ryan Vaillancourt, Los Angeles Downtown News
DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES - The Civic Center has a new gem in the $440 million police headquarters building on First between Main and Spring streets. But as the Los Angeles Police Department preps for the Oct. 24 opening of the new digs, questions remain over what to do with its old home, Parker Center. Read entire article

Businesses Fear 'Landmark' Decision
by Howard Fine, Los Angeles Business Journal Staff
Scores or possibly hundreds of buildings in the city of Los Angeles could be declared historic landmarks in the next few years, and that means big obstacles loom any time one of those buildings is to be renovated. So business groups, developers and even film studio executives are scrambling to get restrictions eased for historic structures. Read entire article

Staples Center 10th anniversary
by Todd Longwell, The Hollywood Reporter
Unless people worked here or they were attending a performance at the Music Center, they just never bothered to come downtown," says Carol E. Schatz, president and CEO of the Central City Association of Los Angeles, an advocacy group for local businesses. Read entire article

Stopping Detroit's brain drain
by Steve Hargreaves, CNNMoney.com
The city is pushing for new businesses, arts and a revitalized downtown to keep young people in this hard-hit town. Read entire article

New Police Unit Focuses on Downtown Graffiti
by Ryan Vaillancourt, Los Angeles Downtown News
DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES - Graffiti is one of the oldest, most ubiquitous forms of urban blight, but until William Bratton came to town seven years ago with an emphasis on stopping small quality-of-life crimes, it was not high on the Los Angeles Police Department's priority list. Read entire article

Updated: Chamber Makes Council Endorsement
by Howard Fine, Los Angeles Business Journal
The Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce announced Wednesday the endorsement of Los Angeles school board member Tamar Galatzan in the Los Angeles City Council district race to replace newly elected city Controller Wendy Greuel. Read entire article

Chrysalis Appoints New CEO
by Anna Scott, Los Angeles Downtown News
The Downtown social services agency Chrysalis has appointed Mark Loranger as its new CEO and president, the organization announced Tuesday. Loranger previously served for two years as vice president of Chrysalis Enterprises, a division of Chrysalis that provides transitional jobs for clients with employment barriers. Read entire article

LAPD Chief William Bratton Leaving in October
by Eric Richardson, blogdowntown
LAPD Chief William Bratton will step down from his post at the end of October, leaving to head the newly formed Altegrity Security Consulting. The firm will provide consulting services to police departments around the world. Read entire article

Rating R: Experts Find That $40 Billion Transit Tax May Not Pay for All They Hoped
by Ryan Vaillancourt, Los Angeles Downtown News
When Los Angeles County voters passed Measure R last November, approving a half-cent sales tax to raise $40 billion for transportation projects, many saw it as a sign that the public was desperate to ease congestion. Read entire article

Showdown Over Historic Buildings Goes to Vote
by Anna Scott, Los Angeles Downtown News
Sparks are expected to fly at Thursday's City Planning Commission meeting, where the panel will vote on a proposal to strengthen the city's historic preservation law. The debate over the city's Cultural Heritage Ordinance has been ongoing for months. Read entire article

Major revisions proposed for Los Angeles' preservation ordinance
by Martha Groves, Los Angeles Times
A proposed overhaul of the city's historic preservation ordinance would grant the Los Angeles Cultural Heritage Commission the authority to bar demolition of designated monuments, a power it now lacks. The ability to deny demolition permits to property owners is among several proposed revisions the Planning Commission is to consider Thursday. Read entire article

Ordinance brings new life into downtown L.A.'s Main Street
by Cara Mia DiMassa, Los Angeles Times
A decade ago, the stretch of downtown L.A.'s Main Street between 4th and 6th streets was a desolate collection of empty buildings and homeless encampments, an area where drug dealing was conducted in the open, and the only longtime residents lived in residential hotels. These days, that stretch resembles a bustling small-town main street. Read entire article

Non-profit group hopes to get a line on history by returning trolleys to downtown Los Angeles.
by David Haldane, Los Angeles Business Journal
A group of property owners, developers, and civic and political leaders has been quietly pushing to revive a scaled-down version of L.A.'s famed Red Cars in the downtown area. Read entire article

City Controller Wendy Greuel blows the whistle on delinquent taxpayers
by Rick Orlov, dailynews.com
Five months after the public disclosure of tax scofflaws generated $2.8 million for city coffers, City Controller Wendy Greuel released an updated list of 126 firms Wednesday that owe more than $107 million in taxes. Read entire article

Developers, Building Owners Could See Fees Increase
by Richard Guzmn and Anna Scott, Los Angeles Downtown News
As city departments continue to tighten their belts amid a $530 million budget deficit, officials this month will vote on raising two kinds of developmentrelated fees. Each could add thousands of dollars to the costs of owning or constructing a building. Read entire article

L.A. ethics officials vote to tighten lobbying rules
Los Angeles Times
After more than a year of deliberations, the Los Angeles City Ethics Commission voted today for a plan aimed at making it easier for the city to enforce its lobbying rules. Read entire article

Business Gets L.A. to Back Down on Planning Fees
by Howard Fine, Los Angeles Business Journal
Developers and business groups have made some headway in pushing to head off steep increases in L.A. city planning fees. Read entire article

Gloves off on cost of Michael Jackson's services
by Maeve Reston and Ari B. Bloomekatz, Los Angeles Times
Hours after the last eulogy to Michael Jackson bounced off the rafters of Staples Center, discussion in Los Angeles civic circles turned to more down-to-earth matters: Were the pop star's death and memorial a net fiscal loss or gain to the city, and should taxpayers get stuck with the tab? Read entire article

It's Still Not Easy Being Green
by Anna Scott, Los Angeles Downtown News
One year after creating strict new environmental standards for large development projects, city officials are raising the bar again. The effort, spurred by the Community Redevelopment Agency, is generating concern from some housing developers, including nonprofit organizations. Read entire article

Lofty Dreams of Downtown Living
By Jia-Rui Chong, The Los Angeles Times
David Stokes, 48, said he has always dreamed of living in downtown Los Angeles in an apartment with a city view. The architect imagined riding a scooter to his office east of Little Tokyo. Read entire article

City OKs Hotel Subsidy Deal
By Patrick McGreevy, The Los Angeles Times
Council approves up to $177 million in aid for high-rise in bid to revive convention trade. Competitors, taxpayer groups attack plan. Read entire article

The New Plate Tectonics
By Julie Tamaki, The Los Angeles Times
Mid-priced restaurant chains are opening locations in downtown Los Angeles, in a shift considered crucial to attracting residents. Read entire article

County Task Force to Debate Plan on Homeless Services
By Carla Rivera, The Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles County would sharply refashion homeless services over the next decade, adding 7,000 emergency shelter beds, 40,000 units of affordable housing and setting up a regionwide housing trust fund under a plan scheduled to be debated by area civic leaders today. Read entire article

L.A. Looking Into Return of Downtown Trolley Line
By Patrick McGreevy, The Los Angeles Times
More than 40 years after the last Pacific Electric Red Car clanged to a stop in Los Angeles, city leaders are weighing a proposal to resurrect the trolley system with a five-mile loop that would connect downtown landmarks from Chinatown to Staples Center. Read entire article

Anschutz Buys Fox's Interest in Staples Center
By Vincent and Sallie Hofmeister, The Los Angeles Times
The deal paves the way for a $1-billion project around the arena that could include a theater and hotels. Read entire article

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