Daily Business Report-Nov. 1, 2018
Manchester Pacific Gateway rendering. The project is expected to be completed by 2021. (Credit: Manchester Financial Group)
Work starts in earnest on massive
Manchester Pacific Gateway project
Manchester Financial Group has launched the $1.5 billion redevelopment of the 13.5-acre Manchester Pacific Gateway on the Downtown waterfront.
“In the 12 years that we have worked on this development, our enthusiasm and commitment has never wavered,” said Chairman Emeritus of Manchester Financial Group, Doug Manchester.
The group hired architect Gensler, general contractor Turner Construction, Urban Strategies Group of Flocke & Avoyer for retail leasing, and Cushman & Wakefield for office leasing.
The Navy Broadway Complex, which is currently the home of the Navy’s regional headquarters, will make way for a new mixed-use development. Manchester Pacific Gateway will feature six buildings totaling 3million square feet within eight city blocks, including a new 17-story Class-A office building for the Navy headquarters.
“The Navy is excited to break ground on a new, state-of-the-art Navy Administrative Building. The Navy and San Diego have had a strong, mutually beneficial relationship for over 100 years and this project is another important chapter in that history,” said Rear Admiral Yancy B. Lindsey, commander of Navy Region Southwest.
The project will include:
• Block 1: 1.9-acre plaza; 29-story, 467,000-square-foot office tower; 68,000 square feet of retail; 198,000-square-foot luxury boutique hotel with 235 rooms.
• Block 2: 29-story, 1 million-square-foot convention center hotel with 1,100 rooms; 37,000 square feet of supporting retail.
• Block 3: 11-story, 197,000-square-foot office building and 75,000 square feet of retail; 17-story, 373,000-square-foot Navy headquarters in a Class A building.
Block 4: Eight-story, 186,000-square-foot office tower; and 91,500 square feet of retail; Four-story, 28,500-square-foot office tower; and 63,500 square feet of retail.
Manchester Pacific Gateway is expected to be completed by 2021.
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Getaround brings car sharing to San Diego
Getaround, a carsharing platform that empowers users to instantly rent and drive great cars shared by people in their city, has arrived in San Diego. Car owners in San Diego can reduce the financial burden of car ownership by sharing their car on Getaround and earning money when people rent it. Each car is equipped with Getaround Connect, a proprietary technology that enables renters to locate and unlock the car using the Getaround app. San Diegans who choose to live car-free, or need a specialty car for a move across town or elsewhere, can now instantly rent nearby cars—by the hour or day—through the Getaround iOS or Android application, with no need to meet the owner in-person to get the car keys.
“We’re thrilled to bring our carsharing platform to San Diego, a city whose culture and landscape make it a hotspot for sightseeing and day trips by both tourists and locals,” said James Correa, Getaround general manager of Southern California. “Powered by the Getaround Connect, renters can instantly access the perfect car for any type of trip or adventure, and car owners can earn money without the hassle of breaking up their day to meet renters.”
To learn more, list your car, or rent a car nearby, visit https://www.getaround.com.
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Suffolk hosts ‘topping out’
for UTC residential tower
To celebrate the “topping out,” or having just poured the top floor of the 240-foot-tall residential tower now under construction at Westfield UTC, the project’s general contractor, Suffolk, will host a worksite ceremony on Friday to mark the significant project milestone.
Slated to open to residents in 2019 and located at the corner of Nobel Drive and Lombard Place, the tower is being developed by Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield and is the company’s first residential project at any of its shopping centers in the United States. The project team also includes design architect Joseph Wong Design Associates, with Greystar serving as the development adviser and managing the tower long-term.
The 23-story residential tower at Westfield UTC will feature 300 residences—all with private balconies—in studio, one-, two-, and three-bedroom designs, along with one penthouse. It will also feature a 26,000-square-foot amenity deck, resort-style pool, cabanas, outdoor grills and kitchens, fire pits, a fitness center, library, private work stations, 24-hour concierge, a Sky Lounge with ocean views and private dining, as well as a clubroom with a sports lounge and indoor/outdoor entertaining space.
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Biotech firm awarded $2 million
grant to help respiratory patients
An Escondido biotech firm has been awarded a $2 million grant to further develop a novel way to deliver medicine for respiratory distress. The company is KAER Biotherapeutics and the grant comes from the National Institute of Health. It will support the development of Supraer aerosol therapy for patients in respiratory distress
The National Heart Lung and Blood Institute of the National Institutes of Health has awarded KAER Biotherapeutics a $2 million Phase II SBIR grant to produce a medical device that will enable surfactant aerosol therapy for the treatment of acute respiratory distress syndrome.
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Board of Supervisors approve
new improved bicycle plan
The San Diego County Board of Supervisors approved a new plan Wednesday that could eventually add several hundred miles of safer, more convenient bicycle lanes to roads in and around unincorporated communities. The board voted 4-0, with Supervisor Ron Roberts absent, to approve a new Active Transportation Plan, the first update of the county’s bike plan since 2003.
The plan will be used to guide the potential addition of bike lanes or bike lane improvements when road projects in unincorporated communities, including resurfacing and repaving, are planned and built in the future.
The transportation plan aims to give county residents healthier opportunities to get around, exercise and have fun, by biking rather than driving on unincorporated roads. County officials said the plan fits in with the County’s Live Well San Diego vision and its Climate Action Plan, which is designed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in unincorporated communities.
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Personnel Announcements
Jeffrey Cota joins CrossCountry Mortgage
CrossCountry Mortgage Inc. has hired Jeffrey Cota to its Southwest reverse lending operations. Outside loan originator Cota joins CrossCountry with over 14 years of experience in the mortgage industry. He is one of fewer than 200 Certified Reverse Mortgage Professionals in the nation. He is also a member of the National Reverse Mortgage Lenders Association and sits on a selective committee tasked with improving the industry through education and upholding moral and ethical standards. He is licensed in California, Arizona, Washington D.C., and Florida.
Cota is accompanied and supported in his origination efforts by Lela Ross. Ross joins CrossCountry Mortgage with over 20 years in the mortgage industry in funding and processing.
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Commentary:
War over bail bonds has only just begun
By Dan Walters | CALmatters Columnist
One of this year’s most contentious legislative battles was over requiring those accused of serious crimes to post cash bail to be released from jail while their cases are pending.
It was seemingly resolved when a bill to eliminate cash bail was passed after a last-minute redrafting of dubious legality Rather than having judges set bail amounts for defendants, the new law would require judges to evaluate their flight risk and decide who should be released and who should be jailed pending trial.
The enactment of Senate Bill 10, however, was just the opening salvo of a multi-front legal and political war.
The bail bond industry – private companies that bail out defendants for fees and sometimes for property they post as security – bitterly opposed the legislation, of course. It would put thousands of storefront bail offices, most of them conveniently located near jails, out of business.
Led by the industry’s giants, such as Aladdin Bail Bonds, it is spending several million dollars to collect the 365,880 registered voter signatures required to place a repeal referendum on the 2020 ballot.
There’s virtually no doubt that the referendum will qualify, automatically suspending the new law until voters decide its fate.
Faced with extinction, the industry will spend heavily to kill the legislation, and its proponents – criminal justice reform and civil rights groups, primarily – don’t appear to have big money to defend it.
The opposition is also divided. The last-minute rewrite granted judges the ultimate authority over who stays in jail or is released and that alienated some anti-bail groups, such as the American Civil Liberties Union. They worried aloud that judges would tend to keep defendants in jail rather than risk the onus if someone released without bail commits a heinous crime.
Bail bond firms may also file suit to overturn the new law, alleging that those late changes violate a constitutional requirement, passed by voters in 2016, requiring bills to be in print for 72 hours before being passed.
SB 10 had sat in limbo for nearly a year, but suddenly, on Aug. 16, was revived in the Assembly Appropriations Committee. A day later – on a Friday afternoon – massive amendments were submitted to the Assembly clerk’s office.
However, official records, including the bill itself, say the amendments were adopted the following Monday, Aug. 20, just before the Assembly approved it on a 42-31 vote. A day later, the Senate gave final approval, sending the bill to Gov. Jerry Brown on a 26-12 vote.
The challenge, if it occurs, would hinge on whether the 72-hour notice period began when the amendments were submitted on Aug. 17 or when they were adopted on Aug. 20.
Meanwhile, another case pending before the state Supreme Court could end, or at least severely curtail, cash bail regardless of whether SB 10 survives.
Last January, a state appellate court in San Francisco declared that in requiring cash bail, judges must consider the financial ability of defendants to afford it, bolstering the basic argument behind SB 10 that bail discriminates against the poor.
Justice J. Anthony Kline, Brown’s close friend and one-time legal adviser, wrote the opinion, which begins with a long quote from Brown’s 1979 State of the State address calling for bail reform.
Attorney General Xavier Becerra refused to appeal Kline’s ruling, but San Francisco District Attorney George Gascon did and lawyers for the issue’s many protagonists are busily submitting briefs seeking to influence the state Supreme Court’s decision whether to uphold or overturn Kline.
Supreme Court Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye is not a disinterested party. She has been a public advocate of bail reform and was a major behind-the-scenes figure in SB 10’s last-minute revision giving judges more authority to decide who goes free and who stays in jail while awaiting trial.
CALmatters is a public interest journalism venture committed to explaining how California’s state Capitol works and why it matters. For more stories by Dan Walters, go to calmatters.org/commentary
