No Cause for Alarm

LYNWOOD, CA – City Council members officially announced to residents and
business owners during Tuesday night’s City Council meeting that the City is in
no way involved with any project being represented by Angeles Fields investors/brokers offering to buy properties along the Atlantic Avenue Corridor.

City officials have been bombarded with telephone calls from both residents and
business owners from the Atlantic Avenue Corridor, situated between Fernwood
Street and Imperial Highway, about investors/brokers approaching them in the
last few weeks, offering to purchase their properties – and in some cases
presenting them with nearly finished Escrow papers.

While any private individual can offer to purchase properties because it is his or
her right, whether they are business oriented or residential, the line is
crossed when that individual – as a representative of a developer – starts
allegedly telling business owners and residents that he or she has an
understanding with the City to acquire and develop certain property in the
City.

City Manager Roger Haley this week released a letter to the business owners and to the residential community – who would have been affected by the defunct Angeles Fields/SuperCenter Proposal officially terminated back in April – letting them know that the City does not have any agreement or understanding with Angeles Fields to develop any use, whether a sports complex or otherwise, within the City.

“The City does not have any present intent or understanding to participate or
otherwise assist in any development of any facility by Angeles Fields,” Haley
states in his letter to business owners and residents on the northeast corner
of the City. “As such, Angeles Fields and any of its related entities, partners,
officers or agents should not represent that the City is in any way involved
with any project planned by Angeles Fields.”

City Attorney Fred Galante, also this week, sent a letter to the attorneys of
Angeles Fields letting them know that the City has been receiving a significant
number calls from residents and business owners inquiring as to whether or not
the City has an understanding with Angeles Fields

Galante asked the attorneys to let all of the individuals representing Angeles Fields to stop telling Lynwood business owners and residents that the City is involved with any project planned by Angeles Fields.

“Please make sure such representations cease immediately,” Galante states in his letter to the attorneys for Angeles Fields.

During Tuesday night’s City Council meeting, a business owner addressed the City
Council asking them why business owners such as himself had not been contacted
by the City about the alleged agreement between the City of Lynwood and Angeles Fields.

The business owner told City Council members that the individuals who approached him at his business on Atlantic Avenue told him that the City was going to eventually condemn his business and force him to give up his property.

“I thought this [project] was dead,” said the business owner. …. “but it’s reared
its ugly head again,” he said about the project proposal Angeles Fields LLC was
awarded back in 2006 by the former City Council, sitting as the Lynwood
Redevelopment Agency, to develop a football stadium in the north eastern part
of the city.

Per the City Council’s approval, Galante clarified to the business owner and to all
in attendance during the meeting that there is no such agreement.

There is no arrangement with Angeles Fields, Galante said, nor with anyone else.
“There is no plan,” he said. “The representations they’re making are inappropriate.”

City Councilwoman Aide Castro called the actions of the individuals approaching
businesses and residents and telling them that they have an agreement with the
City, “a scam.”

“These people from Angeles Fields have no shame,” Castro told the audience, adding that she was told that the individuals representing Angeles Fields also made an offer to Lynwood Unified School District Superintendent Ed Velasquez for the acquisition of the property where LUSD’s Firebaugh High School sits.

From the telephone calls she has received from business owners, as far as she is
concerned, she said, the individuals approaching businesses and residents along
the Atlantic Avenue Corridor, are using “acts of intimidation.”

In his letter to the community, Haley reminds business owners and residents that
the City has no intention to partner with Angeles Fields or is it considering
giving Angeles Fields any financial assistance or opportunities to use any
condemnation authority for any project.

“As you may know, redevelopment has been eliminated and any such powers previously available have been eliminated,” Haley said.

One business owner said that he doesn’t see a problem with the individual
approaching every single business in the area and offering to buy their
properties.

“It’s his right,” said the business owner, adding that still he disagrees with the
individuals lying to business owners and to residents about having a deal with
the City. “Anybody can approach a business and offer to buy it off of them, but
I’d like to see them try to acquire the 800 homes in the area they’re going to
need for such a project – and not to mention the schools that are here, too.”

For more information, business owners and residents may call Sarah Magana Withers at (310) 603-0220 Ext. 317.