CITY OF SUNNYVALE MOVES FORWARD ON REDEVELOPMENT 

SUNNYVALE, Calif. – The City of Sunnyvale has begun taking steps to ensure progress on the redevelopment of the downtown area can proceed unimpeded. The City’s vision for the site currently occupied by the now-closed Town Center mall includes razing the mall structure and rebuilding the area as a traditional downtown.

The redevelopment will include a return to the original street grid and a mixture of retail and residential properties. Features will include a theater complex, restaurants and a town square.

Forum Development Group, which has a purchase agreement for the mall, has filed an application for redevelopment of the mall, but that application cannot be processed by the Planning Commission and City Council because Macy’s, Target and Harvest Partners have not signed the application. Forum had hoped to start construction by August 2004 and open the new center in fall 2005. However, if there is no agreement among the owners so as to permit the City to consider and approve the applications for redevelopment of the mall, neither Forum nor any other party can expect such an early start to construction.

City staff recommended to the Council that a meeting be facilitated between all property owners on the site to seek a voluntary agreement on a plan for redevelopment. At the same time, the Redevelopment Agency is being provided with the powers and processes necessary to undertake redevelopment if the property owners are unable to reach an agreement. These include adoption of updated Owner Participation Rules which protect tenants displaced by redevelopment, establish the rights and responsibilities of property owners to redevelop their property in accordance with the plan, and allow the Agency to select a master developer form among the property owners.

The proposed actions will also include an amendment of the Redevelopment Area Plan to reinstitute the power of eminent domain over non-residential property for a period of

12 years. These are normal powers and processes of a redevelopment agency in California. Their enactment, however, does not require they ever be exercised by the Sunnyvale Redevelopment Agency.

On November 11, the Council and the Redevelopment Agency scheduled a joint public hearing to consider amending the Redevelopment Area Plan.

The Planning Commission is scheduled to make its recommendation to the City Council regarding the proposed amendment on November 24.

Finally, on December 16, the Council and Redevelopment Agency will hold a joint public hearing to consider adoption of the amendment to the Redevelopment Area Plan.