New Date Selected For Concord Naval Base Redevelopment Discussion

CONCORD - A new date has been selected for the Concord City Council to weigh in on the selection of a developer for the first phase of a $6 billion naval base redevelopment project after the meeting was postponed this week.

Three members of the five-person City Council will be participating in a vote on May 11 to potentially proceed with Lennar Urban as the master developer on the Concord Naval Weapons Station reuse project.

Mayor Laura Hoffmeister and Councilmembers Dan Helix and Edi Birsan were originally slated to decide the matter Tuesday but the meeting was postponed due to what city staff said was "the unexpected lack of a quorum." Birsan, in a Facebook post, suggested that the delay was due to a family issue experienced by one of the three councilmembers.

Also on Patch: Concord City Officials Suddenly Postpone Lennar Plan Discussion

During a meeting May 11 at 6:30 p.m. in the Concord City Council's chambers at 1950 Parkside Drive, the trio will discuss a city staff report made public Friday that recommended the council proceed with Lennar or face "adverse ramifications" by choosing another route.

According to the Concord Community Reuse Project website, the meeting will be broadcast live on Concord Cable TV channel 28 (Comcast), 29 (Astound) and 99 (AT&T U-verse) and streamed from the City's website at www.cityofconcord.org.

Lennar is the only firm still competing to be the master developer and a City Council vote to move forward with the firm would conclude a long-delayed selection process that began in January 2014. The selection process was paused after Lennar's former competitor, Catellus Development Corp., made allegations in September that the firm improperly lobbied City Councilman and then-Mayor Tim Grayson.

After the Oct. 6 suicide of City Attorney Mark Coon, an independent attorney, Michael Jenkins, was hired to author a report that responded to the allegations.

Jenkins' report concluded that Lennar did orchestrate campaign contributions from at least one proxy entity to Grayson's state Assembly campaign, constituting a non-legal definition of lobbying.

Grayson recused himself from involvement in the process despite there being no evidence he knew of the Lennar connection.

Vice Mayor Ron Leone has also recused himself from the vote because state law says he has real property interest in the outcome since he lives within 500 feet of the project.

Lennar was allowed to continue in the selection process by the City Council, which said it was best to have multiple bidders. However, the council later denied a request from Catellus to change an aspect of its term sheet, granting them permission instead to drop out of the process and limiting the selection to Lennar.

Lennar later was asked to upgrade certain areas of its term sheet -- adding to affordable housing and transportation infrastructure commitments, among other items -- ahead of its selection as master developer.

The firm agreed.

The City Council next week will vote on whether to accept the term sheet revisions Lennar came to with city staff and then vote to possibly move into further negotiations with the firm by making them the project's master developer.

-Bay City News, image by Daniel Schwen, and is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 Generic license.