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July 7, 2014 <br />_.7 n!;t 9 <br />n is <br />r „•l <br />SANTA ANA 'A.OMMUNITY <br />& BUSINESS ALLIANCE <br />Comment Letter No. 8 <br />Mndeleine Spencer <br />333 Gast 916 it 303 <br />Santa Ana, CA 92701 <br />714 -815 -2653 <br />spenel 111(ii;;mail.chapman.edu <br />City Manager David Cavazos, City Attorney Sonia Carvalhe, Mayor Pulido, Council <br />Members & City Staff, <br />SUBJECT: STATEMENT OF OPPOSITION TO SANTA ANA'S FIXED GUIDEWAY <br />(STREETCAR) PROJECT CONNECTING TO GARDEN GROVE <br />Dear City of Santa Ana, <br />Over the next several years, construction of a fixed guideway project on Pourfll <br />Street will cause a contraction in spending in the corridor which over the course of the 8 -1 <br />construction will result in a cumulative decline in aggregate demand for the products <br />currently sold by merchants on this street. This will severely test businesses in a time <br />when the economy has already severely slowed. The fact that the city has proposed this <br />as their "preferred route” raises many questions as to whether this proposed plan is in fact <br />a marker of sorting, and has re- reminded business owners on Fourth Street of the many <br />previous attempts that have been made by the city since 1985 to agitate long standing <br />businesses along this street. <br />This process of agitation began with the marked failure to redevelop the area <br />originally larown as the Fiesta Marketplace, this was first proposed in official records 85- <br />432141. Redevelopment procedures for Fourth Street which would harm business owners 8 -2 <br />re- emerged in the "Renaissance Plan," which resulted in a series of policies of unequal <br />and differential investment of public and private resources on this street beginning with <br />the "Fourth Street Fagade Program" and in the 2008 establishment of "CID" or the <br />Community Improvement District for the same area which without the knowledge of a <br />majority of the business owners was conspired to only benefit a few businesses along the <br />corridor who profited from the tripled property tax assessments by way of what was <br />referred to as "Property Based Improvement Districts" or PBIDs which was found illegal <br />by the Grand Jury in accordance with the California Penal Code 993 and 993:1 The £act <br />that now in June of 2014 the city has sought again to pursue a fixed guideway (streetcar $ 3 <br />75A -98 <br />