State of the City 2005
Mayor Elaine Scruggs
Good afternoon. Thank you for being here today to support the Glendale Chamber of Commerce and the City of Glendale.
It is my pleasure to present this annual report of our accomplishments in the past year—and plans for continued business vitality in Glendale.
In its Sunday, December 26, 2005 edition, The Arizona Republic referred to the West Valley as “transforming from an ugly duckling to a happening place.” Most of us probably don’t agree with being portrayed as an “ugly duckling,” but I am sure we all agree with our new identity as “a happening place.” Here is some of what has been going on in Glendale in 2004 to earn our status as a “happening place.”
At the end of September, construction began on 500,000 square feet of development directly in front of the Jobing.com Arena. This entertainment village is phase one of the spectacular Westgate project. And it has triggered a flurry of new activity in the area.
There are currently 10 additional commercial and residential projects underway nearby. The most visible of those projects is the $370 million multi-purpose stadium just south of our Jobing.com Arena. Amazing as it seems—next year’s NFL season will take place right there in that stadium—in Glendale.
But some of you are not as curious about that 2006 season inside the state0owned stadium as you are about what has been going on inside the city-owned Jobing.com Arena.
Some folks—certainly no one in this room—even wonder if the City of Glendale is going broke because of the National Hockey League lockout. The answer to the first question is that there has been a lot going on inside the Jobing.com Arena. And the answer to the second question is that we are not going broke.
When we entered into this project in 2001, the probability of an NHL strike was well known. Therefore, we included a contingency plan in our bond program. In addition to that financial protection, our arena has performed tremendously well during its inaugural year. Ninety-eight events took place in the Jobing.com Arena in 2004 in addition to the hockey games that were played there in the first quarter. In that number were 20 concerts—including sold-out performances by four of the top 10 grossing tours in the United States. World championship boxing; rodeos; and Arizona Sting lacrosse games were among other ticketed events.
And, of course, I have yet to mention that the arena hosted not one, but two world wrestling events, which I understand our own Chamber president Don Rinehart had front row seats for. That just goes to show that you can find everything and everyone at the Jobing.com Arena.
The Phoenix area market is extremely competitive—as you know. Yet, in the most recent ranking of the top 100 Arenas for total tickets sold to non-sporting events, our Jobing.com Arena came in at number 54 in the entire world in our first year. This put us ahead of such other venues as the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas, the American Airlines Arena in Miami and America West Arena in Phoenix. America West, by the way, came in at number 93.
As 2004 drew to a close, the City of Glendale entered into a very important agreement with the Arizona Interscholastic Association. That agreement establishes our Jobing.com Arena as the venue for all Arizona High School state championships in basketball, wrestling and spirit line—for the next five years. This month-long tournament series is called February Frenzy, and it kicks of this Saturday. It will bring another 65,000 people to our Arena and to the entire West Valley.
Our partnership with AIA is truly an economic engine, but it also is one more way we are fulfilling our commitment for the Jobing.com Arena to be a true community asset that can be used and enjoyed by everyone. Another 2004 success story is the opening of the Northern Crossing power center.
Many of you here today will recall that a key factor in our agreement to build the Jobing.com Arena was the Ellman Companies’ agreement to re-develop the blighted former mall at 59th and Northern avenues—just a mile from here [downtown]. That property is now known as “Northern Crossing,” and it officially opened in March 2004, more than two years ahead of the time frame set in the contractual agreements we signed with Steve Ellman. The Wal-Mart Super Center, which is one of Northern Crossing’s two anchors, is already producing in the top 5 percent among all Wal-Marts in the country. Lowe’s home improvement center recently opened at Northern Crossing, and 10 more businesses will be opening very shortly.
Economic development also was still strong in North Glendale in 2004. California Casualty, Cosmopolitan Services and Credit Union West became new tenants in Talavi Business Park. Just a mile north of Talavi, Arrowhead Ranch Plaza opened at 59th Avenue and Union Hills Drive. Champion Partners developed this very attractive project, which features 68,000 square feet of office condos, which are all sold, and 64,000 square feet of retail, which is fully leased.
With the complex negotiations and agreements in Western Glendale finally completed in the second half of 2004, we were able to focus more directly on our priority of re-development in our city center area. This area, which includes our downtown, stretches from 43rd Avenue west to 67th Avenue.
The City of Glendale obtained ownership of the former Wells Fargo Bank just outside the front door of this building and demolished the former Glendale Adult Center across the street from where many of you parked today. The former Wells Fargo Bank will receive a new façade, and the interior will be converted into much-needed additional meeting room space for this Civic Center.
Our Civic Center has only been open for four years, but its attractive features and our very customer-oriented staff have built it into one of the most desirable settings for conferences, meetings, celebrations and trade shows. Unfortunately, a lot of business has to be turned away because of a shortage of space. Like you, we don’t want to lose any business.
The renovation will also include classroom and display space built for the Bead Museum, which is located across the parking lot on the West side of the bank building. The Bead Museum is a unique cultural treasure and an important component of our tourism program. It brings more than 30,000 visitors annually to our downtown and can contribute even more to our economy with the planned expansion.
To connect the three buildings into a campus setting, the parking area will be converted into a downtown plaza, enhancing the cultural and pedestrian amenities in this area. The site of our former Adult Center is being temporarily used for parking, but provides opportunity for new development that complements our downtown plan.
In December, we purchased a little more than six acres of vacant property previously used as a car dealership at Glendale and 47th avenues. Our future plans for that site include converting the existing building into a new headquarters for our police department and constructing a 90,000-square-foot city court building to be completed in 2008.
Also in December, we purchased land at 52nd Avenue and Lamar Road for a new fire station. These projects will bring more than 100 employees, additional pedestrian traffic and, hopefully, investment by the private sector.
To accomplish the goals set out in our city center master plan, in November, the Glendale City Council gave direction to our City Manager to include significant funding in our future years’ budgets for land acquisitions and other actions that will lead to increased economic and social vitality in the broader area of downtown Glendale.
In previous years, I reported that the City of Glendale was going to be aggressively seeking partners to help us achieve our best possible future in the western area of Glendale. Today, I am reporting we have that same resolve for our city center area.
You only have to look at our track record of successes to know that investment in the Glendale city center today will produces excellent financial returns in the very near future.
To help us achieve all of our goals, a new Glendale economic development team was formed. I would like to introduce you to them now and will ask each member to stand as I read their name.
Iain Vasey is our Economic Development Director. Iain served as our re-development manager from 2000 to 2002 and was instrumental in developing the city center master plan we are now implementing. After two years as business development director for the City of Las Vegas, Iain has returned home to Glendale.
Tony Moon is the Assistant Director and joined our team in June. He knows the Valley well from his work in Goodyear and Surprise. Tony most recently worked as the president and CEO of a non-profit regional economic development group serving northern Los Angeles.
Debbie Smith will be taking a lead role in working with Glendale businesses seeking to expand. She has extensive experience in that field as well as business attraction, client services and business retention. Debbie joined our team in October from Las Vegas.
Rod Miller came to us in August, right after graduating with a Masters degree from Harvard. Rod will be taking a leading role in analyzing economic development projects, economic impacts and methods of project financing.
Paul Zampini has been an integral part of Glendale’s marketing department for many years. He is now dividing his time and his creative talents with both our economic development and marketing departments. Paul will develop new brochures and other collateral material to be used for business attraction.
Jennifer Reichelt coordinates our downtown business development efforts and has taken a lead role in major development projects. Jennifer joined the department in August 2003 after working as a member of the City Manager’s team for two years.
Joanne Barker is the veteran of the team. Joanne has been a key member of our economic development department for five years and manages our successful visual improvement program.
Ladies and gentlemen, Glendale’s economic development team.
Now I would like to talk about some of the new projects you can expect to see in 2005 as well as discuss our highest economic development priorities and plans for this year.
We are looking forward to Paragon Properties beginning construction very soon on the mixed-used development named Cornerstone at Glendale. Located at 99th Avenue and Camelback Road, this project will include 50,000 square feet of retail and restaurants and more than 100,000 square feet of office and business park space. It will spur a capital investment of approximately $18 million and create more than 350 jobs.
Securing high-quality hotels in our western area continues to be a priority. We expect to make an announcement in this regard in the first half of this year. 2005 will be the year in which we move into a high gear with our planning efforts for the major sporting events coming to Glendale, beginning with the NHL All-Star Game in January 2006. We should know in the next few months whether the Barrett-Jackson car auction and weeklong schedule of related attractions is added to that list.
As you may have read and heard, Glendale has been in talks with Craig Jackson to determine whether our Arena and the adjacent area will meet the complex and vast needs of this internationally known and wildly popular event. If Barrett-Jackson does relocate to Glendale, it will be a huge economic engine for the entire West Valley.
The issue that will undoubtedly be watched with the most intense interest in 2005 involves a policy decision that the City Council will be making, hopefully in the next coupe of months. That decision will be whether or not we will begin annexation proceedings to move Glendale’s city limits further west.
When our residents voted to approve the Glendale general plan in 2002, they voted on our entire municipal planning area. That planning area encompasses 91 square miles. Only 57 of those 91 square miles are within Glendale city limits. The remaining 34 square miles are in Glendale’s strip-annexed area, which was established in the late 1970s and is located west of 115th Avenue to Perryville Road and from Camelback Road on the south to generally Peoria Avenue on the North.
The majority of this area is currently undeveloped, however, development interest has increased tremendously over the last few years. With construction of Loop 303 now guaranteed by the passage of Proposition 400, there will be a new five-mile long “window of opportunity” in the far western portion of our municipal planning area.
Our City Council has met three times so far, and will continue to meet and discuss the options available to us. With so much development pending, I believe we have a responsibility to indicate to the community at large whether we will step forward to seek property owners’ consent for Glendale to annex some or all of the land and in what time frame.
No other decision before our City Council at this time will so greatly impact Glendale’s future for years to come. It is time to decide, and we will decide.
Long-term visions and projects are nothing new for us. The revitalization of our downtown is definitely our longest-term effort, and as I said earlier, our priority is to increase economic and social vitality in our downtown and the broader city center areas. Our goal is to create an urban village by combining unique residential living options with existing businesses and adding offices, stores, restaurants and city-owned facilities.
Several years ago, we began acquiring properties for our own municipal uses. Beginning in 2005, we also will acquire under-performing properties to be sold to private sector partners who share our vision for the area.
I believe that before summer is over, we will be considering proposals from developers who want to build new residential and commercial projects right here in the heart of downtown Glendale. I sincerely believe the development community is ready to move forward because this is the right time and the right place.
One of the impediments to increased economic development opportunities for downtown Glendale and the entire city center area has been the six-way intersection crossings along Grand Avenue. Most of the intersections have been improved at grossing both south and north of Glendale Avenue Now it is time for the crossing at Glendale, 59th and Grand avenues to be re-aligned.
This 18-month project will create serious challenges for businesses and visitors alike. Recognizing the impacts that businesses could experience, our marketing department began work two years ago on a comprehensive plan to promote downtown even more than we already do.
This year, you will see special events, advertising, promotions and other activities all designed to bring visitors and shoppers to downtown Glendale during the construction period. The City Council approved this $400,000 marketing and business promotion program to make sure everyone knows Glendale is “open for business” during the Grand Avenue construction period.
The quality, quantity and diversity of economic development in Glendale since 2001 surely have no equal in any other similar-size city. Yet, because everything gets done right and on time, it is easy to not think about what goes on behind the scenes to make it all possible.
Today, I want to recognize and thank the huge team of city employees, who work every day, in some instances around the clock, 24-7, to build and maintain a strong infrastructure for our community.
Long before the Jobing.com Arena, Westgate or the Stadium were even words in our daily vocabulary, our city planners, engineers and public safety officials identified the infrastructure needed to support the commercial and residential development we wanted to attract. We have already spent more than $100 million on building a new fire and police station, a wastewater treatment plant and several city parks.
Even the recent purchase of a telescoping aerial ladder fire truck was a component of our economic development plan. It was purchased to support high-rise office buildings, which we plan to see in our city very soon.
All of these capital investments and more are occurring at a time when cities in California are in dire shape. For one city, the situation is so bad they are closing their libraries because they are not able to pay for the day-to-day operations. Here in Glendale, Arizona, we have plans to add a new, fourth library.
The quality of services, and the quality of life that Glendale provides through our capital investments, services, programs and public amenities will continue to help us prepare for new development and re-development projects throughout our city.
In the previous three years, I said we believed in ourselves and the tremendous potential in our western area. I said we were willing to wait for the right partners who would help us achieve our city’s un-met needs and our vision for the future. The right partners came along with the right projects, and history is being made in western Glendale.
Now I am saying that we believe in the tremendous potential in our city center, and we are again seeking partners. With our track record, you should be checking into these opportunities very soon, before success makes the cost of investment much higher.
In 2002, I said that we are not done yet. I said that we are still aggressive and are committed to competing for every project that will help us reach our goal of achieving our best possible future. The same is true today, February 1, 2005. We have the will and commitment to continue to make things happen in Glendale. Do you?
As business leaders and developers, I invite you, I encourage you, I challenge you to actively partner with us as we work towards fulfilling our economic vision in Glendale. Partnerships can come about in many ways—by collaborating with us on a new project, by upgrading and improving your existing property, even by selling your property to someone who does want to take on a development or redevelopment project that you do not want to tackle.
In our downtown area alone, there are more than 40 acres of either vacant or under-utilized property. We are not going to sit back and “just wait for something to happen.”
We sincerely hope you won’t either.
By working together, we can build our best possible future.
Thank you. |
