Throughout this eerily quiet, empty week in Downtown, nail-biting is the main pastime at City Hall where a threatening black cloud has been polluting the governmental air for almost 52 consecutive weeks, since Gov. Brown returned to office.
His first dooming pronouncement was that Redevelopment Agencies — a boon to hundreds of small towns across the state — must die because they interrupt the flow of needed tax revenues to Sacramento.
Last Aug. 11, the state Supreme Court agreed to judge the merits of two Assembly bills, one of which would dissolve the agencies before the dinner hour (AB 26) and the other that would allow the agencies to continue to operate (AB 27), but with leg chains. This means that 400 city halls across the state would be obligated — every year — to send millions of previously exclusively local money to the state capital to spend hither and yon.
The Supreme Court has promised a ruling by Jan. 15, timely because days later the 400 communities in limbo must sent their first hefty payments of millions to Sacramento.
City Manager John Nachbar and the City Council/Redevelopment Agency are, of course, pulling for the court to throw out both halves of Gov. Brown’s master plan short-cut to shrinking California’s current $13 billon deficit.
If the Ruling Goes Sour
As Councilman Andy Weissman noted today, if the court validates the first part of Gov. Brown’s plan (AB 26), to eliminate redevelopment, there is no recourse for City Hall but to fold and go home. If the second part of the plan (AB 27) is upheld, the so-called pay-to-play portion, redevelopment business will resume, presumably within more restricted financial parameters.
Since last January, Culver City’s Redevelopment Agency has been plotting a tall latticework of contingency plans. They are desperate for clarity.
“A lot of uncertainty and nervousness around here,” Mr. Weissman said.
“It is the uncertainty of what rules we are going to be playing under that causes the most anxiety. Without question, a ruling adverse to the continuation of redevelopment in any form would be extremely unfortunate for Culver City.
“The court's decision is eagerly awaited because, without the certainty that comes with whatever the ruling is, city staff, the development community and the Culver City community at-large are completely up in the air as to what we can expect as far as our ability to continue to improve Culver City.”
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— A plaintive question frequently invoked throughout the past 12 months was whether Gov. Brown, virtually by fiat, can singlehandedly kill Redevelopment Agencies that seem to have achieved immense amounts of face-saving good in hundreds of small towns.
Redevelopment came to Culver City in the late 1960s, and Mr. Weissman argues that it has performed major positive surgery on the community — “especially when you think of what it has meant to Westfield Culver City, to Costco, to Downtown.
“When you talk about redevelopment’s impact in Culver City, you would be startled.
• “You factor in the economic costs of the building itself — land, lumber labor,
• “You factor in real property taxes,
• “You factor in jobs created by redevelopment, and
• “You factor in business licenses.
“With all of that, you can see what a difference it has made in Culver City in the last 40-plus years.”
Unlike athletic or political contests, the Supreme Court is not telegraphing any signals how it will rule. Every prediction of the outcome is an untethered guess, based on nothing.
