SB Economic Summit
I attended the economic summit at the NOS this morning.
Very interesting to hear a handful of movers and shakers - including Pat Morris, John Husing and John Magness of Hillwood Development - talk in detail about the health of the local economy.
SAN BERNARDINO -- The city has a promising batch of concepts and projects in development, but a cautious, proactive approach is needed to ensure the housing crisis doesn't leave lasting legacies of blight and landlord-dominated neighborhoods.
The prognosis was sketched by a star-studded speakers' list of government, business and academic leaders during the second annual "San Bernardino Summit: Restoring the All-America City," a Rotary Club organized event conceived as an economic update and strategy session.
Despite a sluggish national economy and even more acute pain locally - Economist John Husing said the region was gripped in recession - the overrall tone was optimistic.
Population will continue to grow, and a number of major projects portend renewed life downtown, speakers said.
Growing employment at the San Bernardino International Airport, a burgeoning logistics industry and a key opportunity to improve the city's low home-ownership rate face the city in the next few years, speakers told a crowd of about 160.
Public investment, including $800 million into a widening of I-215, a county campus, a courthouse and a bus and rail transit depot downtown, will draw additional private investment, speakers said.
Crucial to shoring up employment is the former Norton Air Force Base, where more than 10,000 jobs were lost in the 1990s when the government opted to shutter the facility.
John Magness, vice president of Hillwood Development, the airport's master developer, said aviation, warehousing and other investments had restored 3,300 jobs to the site, and predicted a workforce exceeding 10,000 in the next decade as the airport becomes a hub for passenger and cargo traffic.
"Bigger is truly better," Magness said of development at the airport, where he said Hillwood had built 7.6 million square feet of structures, ramped up tax increments from nothing to about $7 million and drawn $445 million in private investment since 2002.
"Our city thinks too small," Magness added. "Think bigger, and we'll get bigger results."
Magness, the west coast chief of the mega developer founded by Ross Perot Jr., did not shy from prodding local and state political officials to adopt a more business-friendly stance.
He said the city should get more aggressive in property acquisition, using eminent domain if necessary to facilitate larger development. He slammed state legislators for failing to "even the playing field" with low-tax and low-regulation states like Alabama, which he said discouraged aviation and manufacturing development.
Magness also said the city should adopt ordinances to encourage green development and that community colleges and others needed a sustained focus on training the local labor force.
"Yes, these are logistics jobs," Magness said, acknowledging the work's blue-collar reputation in contrast to high tech growth in places like the Silicon Valley. "But guess what, these are the people who live in our city."
Education was a reccuring theme. San Bernardino Valley College Chancellor Don Averill and Cal State San Bernardino President Al Karnig both gave presentations emphasizing their institutions' roles in directly stimulating the local economy.
Husing said just 11.7 percent of the city's residents had a 4-year degree or higher, which he said was far lower than the already low countywide rate. Additionally, 62 percent of adult residents had no college experience, leaving the workforce underprepared for job-growth in any sector.
And housing, with just under 50 percent of the city's households renting, was a major economic and social drag, Husing said.
With depressed - but stabilizing - prices, the city has a key opportunity to help get more homeowners into housing in the next few years, Husing said.
"If it goes to landlords," Husing said, "then the leaders of this city haven't done their job."
Mayor Pat Morris, who delivered a joint presentation with Economic Development Director Emil Marzullo, ticked off a laundry list of promising projects early in his remarks: A tentatively planned $300 million county government campus, a 12-story courthouse, a coming public transit center on Rialto Avenue and E Street, and a nearly complete terminal at the airport.
He also envisioned an education park near downtown, a creek running through town and a vibrant downtown nightlife, all as part of the dense, public-transit anchored "New Urbanism" he and Marzullo said is key to the city's future.
Morris told the crowd he saw the city's entrenched challenges that morning.
Morris had attended a local job fair for parolees, which he had supported with letters to local employers urging them to attend.
Morris said more than 1,000 out-of-work people lined several blocks.
But the response from employers was "almost pathetic," Morris said, adding that private business had an obligation to partner with the community.
"I walked down the line, shook their hands, wished them well, and felt like hell," Morris said.
Isn't it a wonderful thing to watch all of these so called experts plan the future of the city without dealing with the current issues which continue to drag it down into obscurity? There are so many issues to deal with and nobody seems genuine in their proposals. Can the city afford to listen to Husing who is peddling the same economic dribble which has led to a world wide economic collapse?
Of course he is optimistic about the future of the region because he's getting paid to slam everything about it while offering nothing in the way of a solution. He is working from an economic model which doesn't consider the unique conditions which led us to the place we currently occupy. After decades of political corruption, mis-appropriation of funds and a general neglect of the majority of the cities residents, they want to pretend all of this started when the bond and real estate markets began their slides. Well this is a small part of the problem. If we assess the situation honestly, we'd all agree that when the rest of the nation was experiencing economic growth, San Bernardino was bogged down in a decades long slump caused primarily by ineffective leadership and corrupt government practices.
It wasn't until the current administration began handing out public funds to draw local law enforcement agencies under the federal umbrella that San Bernardino was able to attract federal funding for the first time since the early 80s.
So this brings me to Mayor Morris. I've often wondered why an esteemed jurist would leave the halls of justice for the ally's of politics? It's possible Judge Morris decided to become Mayor Morris to provide his family with immunity from the economic struggles the rest of the community is facing. That would explain his choosing his son as his chief of staff. It would also explain the gifted contracts to a business associated with his daughter. So as you see when Judge/Mayor Morris speaks, he speaks out of concern for his own interests.
Which brings me to my next point. Out of all the developers operating in the area, why is it that a firm which is essentially Texan in its origins the "master developer," of an airport project which remains stalled? Inquiring minds would also like to know why we aren't further along in the development process with said airport project? Could it be that the free market appologists don't want to admit that the major decision maker in this saga "which is Los Angeles World Airports," is totally opposed to an independent player cutting into their action?
Lets approach this realistically, how are you going to operate a passenger terminal without benefit of an air traffic control tower? How are you going to convince Los Angeles World Airports to voluntary abdicate an area they consider to rightfully be theirs? I could be mistaken but history tells us that this is another grand scam for a select few to sift away the occasional pittance which trickles in from the FAA for building and terminal improvements which we've yet to see?
As for the improvement projects they listed. In what way will spending $800 million on freeway widening projects improve the economy and why would we want to encourage more leaches to the area to sift away more of what we are already fighting to save. Money. Why not use the $800 million to build up the educational and healthcare systems everyone constantly denounces yet continues to do nothing about? Why not use some of that money to encourage entrepreneurial ventures which will lead to increased job opportunities as well as foster local pride.
Why are we spending local tax dollars to improve a public highway with absolutely no chance of obtaining a return on this investment? Why are we not partnering with the state or county on this venture? Do they not benefit from this "investment"?
They mentioned the population growth we've experienced yet casually throw in that nearly 50% of the people in town are renters. Many of these same people are commuters which means that with the rising cost of fuel, they are more likely to move out of this economically strapped area in order to reduce their expenditures somewhere closer to where they work.
All of this is something that should be considered, but if that were the case we wouldn't have people in place who think the answers to our problems lie in promoting the criminal element to justify the continued move toward the establishing of San Bernardino as a model police colony.