Last year the Third Avenue Village Association hired New City America as its new management consultant after deciding not to renew former executive director Luanne Hulsizer’s contract.
New City America president and now TAVA Executive Director Marco Li Mandri is a San Diego native who has worked in business district revitalization efforts since 1988. New City America has established 90 Business Improvement Districts/Community Benefit Districts across the U.S. One of the most effective of Li Mandri’s managed districts is San Diego’s Little Italy neighborhood,
Since taking over, Li Mandri has been evaluating TAVA and has plans to revitalize and expand the influence of TAVA and Third Avenue in South Bay.
Li Mandri said in looking over the operations and construction of the organization that TAVA operates based on two assessment districts, the Business Improvement District which is now 30 years old and is an assessment district of merchants and business license holders that generates around $20,000 per year. Then there is the Property Based Improvement District which generates $475,000 per year.
“Previously, TAVA had written in their budget, even during COVID, that it would be generating $100,000 per year,” he said. “The first thing we found out is that the budget at the beginning of the year 2021 was set at around $575,000, but what actually came in was $90,000 less. We had to figure out how to maneuver. It had some savings, so we were able to operate on some of the accumulated reserves from years.”
Li Mandri said he realized that TAVA’s PBID plan and in the Management District Plan, it outlines how funds are supposed to be allocated, using an assessment methodology.
“I have formed 90 districts. I have a pretty good idea on how this is formed,” he said. “One thing we immediately realized is for example there are some apartments coming up on the old city parking lots, predominately around Church Street. Usually in assessment methodology, if a parking lot is not going to be an eight story building, more assessments would be generated because there are buildings correlated where originally there was not. Under the PBID plan that the consultant wrote about five years ago, you could have an 80 story building on Third Avenue, and it would not generate one more penny because of the way the assessment methodology was written. Which creates problems.”
Li Mandri said when more people are living within the boundaries of a district, sometimes they have dogs, sometimes they walk up and down the street, they use more trash cans, but there is no way to mitigate the impact of those additional activities.
“I have to look at that assessment methodology and figure out how, when there are new buildings built, that they are paying and contributing their fair share to the overall assessment district,” he said. “That is typical in other assessment districts because you do not want the assessments to go up for everybody, but you do want the people that are now building new developments to contribute. And that is not how the assessment methodology is written at this point. That is something I must look at, work with property owners on.”
Li Mandri said the district is a 501(c)(6), a mutual benefit corporation.
“We are trying to transition it, and the board has approved new bylaws to make it a public benefit nonprofit corporation, which is a charitable corporation,” he said. “This means if people want to contribute, and it is not a business expense, say we are doing a public space and they wanted to buy tables, chairs and umbrellas to donate to the association, we get the charitable write off for it.”
TAVA has four committees. The Executive Committee, Civil Sidewalks Committee, District Identity & Placemaking Committee, and the Land-Use & Project Review Committee. Li Mandri said they revamped the committee structure because it was not operating or functioning properly.
“We have what we call New City Standard,” he said. “One thing we learned over the years is we should systematize everything in these districts, so the board operates in the same way, the formats for the minutes are the same, and the committee structure is the same. A good committee structure expedites to go from an idea to a recommendation from the committee to the board to get implemented. One thing we have done effectively in Little Italy and other districts is implement decisions very quickly because of the way the corporation is structured.”
Li Mandri said he is looking at possible expansion of District H and E streets to increase the footprint of the PBID and looking at bayfront development.
“In many ways, Third Avenue will become the downtown to the bayfront development,” he said. “When people go to the San Diego Convention Center they go to the Gaslamp. There are a huge amount of people coming into the city of Chula Vista as the bayfront is built and they will be saying, ‘What do we do tonight?’ Maybe they will eat at the bayfront, but maybe a second night they want to try something else. So, we are looking at the linkage between the bayfront development as well as Third Avenue becoming the critical commercial district that visitors will want to attend and see.”
Li Mandri said TAVA is now working on multiple fronts in altering and restructuring the organization. Looking at additional revenue sources that would be non-assessment district resources. Looking at bringing in a successful farmer’s market which would generate money for TAVA, and we are looking at doing much more events that are more artistic.
“We did the Dia De Los Muertos. It was the first time it had been done. It was really successful, and we had about one to two weeks to put it together. But it worked out well,” he said. “We are looking at doing the ArtWalk in South Bay like in Little Italy, looking at the farmer’s market, to become far more entrepreneurial as a district management corporation. We are taking all the lessons we learned in Little Italy and other districts that we manage and applying them in Chula Vista. Not as a cookie cutter approach, but as an approach that we have seen work.”
Li Mandri said when you enter Third Avenue from E Street that on three of the corners there is either an empty lot or the auto repair place and the Bank of America.
“One thing we are trying to do is to track new development,” he said. “So that corral that you have there now is 10,000 square-feet is a great opportunity for mixed development. It would be retail and commercial on the bottom and then residential upstairs. Between Third and Fourth avenues, much of the zoning accommodates multi-family development. We would not see that as a commercial entity, but there would be many more people living in that reservoir between E and F streets and Third and Fourth. We would like to see that facilitated as quickly as possible.”
Li Mandri said they are working closely with the City, getting essential information about the district and that he has been working closely with Deputy City Manager Eric Crockett to bring in new developers. He said residential growth around the district is vital information in forming plans to revitalize the district and accommodate new residents that live in the area. He said currently, there are more than 300 apartment units which could yield up to 500 people, which have either been approved or are currently under construction.
