Developer Withdraws Proposal for Hamilton Town Center

This was posted today on our Hamilton Forum yahoo group. I think that the developer is making a good move to allow the community engagement process to take place ahead of his proposal. I have included the info for the first meeting on March 20 at 7 p.m. at the Hamilton Community Center. Please come. *************************************************** Dear Hamilton neighbors, My name is Mohammad Javanbakht and I am a principal of Avesta Development Group. You may know us as the developer of the Hamilton Hospital property, which is set to become a senior housing community. As you may be aware, Avesta recently expressed an interest to the City regarding the revitalization of the Hamilton Town Square property. However, we have heard neighborhood concerns about our proposal and want to take a step back at this time with the understanding that Hamilton residents will be provided with the opportunity to shape the vision for the Town Square. While we remain interested in creating a revived Town Square with a rehabilitated theater and other community-serving amenities, we have decided to withdraw our preliminary proposal. Below is the text of the withdrawal letter to the City. I have also attached a signed copy of the letter that was provided to the City of Novato. Please feel free to distribute to anyone who is not a member of this forum. Warm regards, Mohammad ******************************************************* To: City of Novato 922 Machin Avenue Novato, California 94945 Attn: Mr. Scott Ward RE: Withdrawal of Proposal to revitalize the property known as “Parcel D - Hamilton Town Square Parcel” Dear Scott, I would like to inform you that Avesta Development Group respectfully withdraws its proposal to revitalize the Hamilton Town Square parcel. Based on the understanding that the City had already planned to begin a public process to determine future of the City owned parcels, it seems that our proposal may have been premature. While we remain interested in a potential public-private collaboration, we want to respect the City’s process and will participate in any capacity that is appropriate to assist in bringing the community’s vision for the Town Square parcel to fruition. It appears that our proposal may have caused concern and misunderstanding among the members of the community. I would like to take this opportunity to clarify the intent of our proposal and reaffirm our commitment to the success of Hamilton as a community. We are strong believers in Hamilton’s future as a peaceful and family oriented community. This belief is signified by our substantial investment into the Hamilton Hospital property, which is arguably the most difficult property to bring back to life in Hamilton Field. Fundamentally, we view ourselves as one of Hamilton’s many stakeholders with a vested interest in preserving its character and historical charm. The Town Square parcel represents a unique opportunity to create a public asset for Hamilton. As such, we share the neighborhood’s interest in seeing the Town Square come back to life and become a vibrant and active centerpiece in Hamilton. One that contributes to the beauty of Hamilton and also to the quality of life of its residents, including the future residents of our senior housing community. While our proposal for the Town Center was only conceptual at this early stage in the public process, it reflected the importance of having the majority of the property be developed into various public amenities, including a large community park and children’s playground where residents could gather and spend time with their families. The proposal also included the rehabilitation of the historic theater as a center for entertainment that could be used in a variety of ways, such as a single screen theater, center of performing art, arts exhibition hall, and many other uses as deemed appropriate by the community. We also envisioned including a neighborhood-serving retail use that would be identified through resident input. Our proposed solution to pay for the rehabilated theater and community-serving spaces was through a modest number of housing units targeted at the active adults age group (55+). The exact amount was undetermined. However, our proposal highlighted the fact that we could utilize our adjacent Hamilton Hospital property to locate a portion of the building footprint; therefore, maintaining most of the Town Square parcel for the development of the public amenities. Such private financing solutions would ensure that no additional financial burden was placed on the residents of Hamilton to pay for the cost of the public improvements at the Town Square. Further, the proposal also considered deeding back public areas of the rehabilitated parcel to the City to ensure that the ultimate ownership of the Town Square is with the City of Novato for the benefit of the members of Hamilton community. An active and vibrant Town Square in Hamilton is as significant importance to the success of our future senior housing community as it is to the rest of the Hamilton community. Therefore, by structuring a public private partnership with the City of Novato, we would be able to lend our resources in order to ensure that the Town Square property and the theater building were finally revitalized. As a private entity, we are able to access financing options that would otherwise be unavailable to public entities, such as the City of Novato. Therefore, we would be able to rehabilitate the Town Square not only sooner, but at greater savings to the local taxpayers. As a final point of clarification, our proposal intentionally did not include a price for the property because of the need to engage the community and to participate in public workshops in order to shape the vision for the property. That is the only way to understand the precise costs of such a development and to identify various means to pay for the public amentities. Our intention was to present an initial concept for the Town Square revitalization and to begin a conversation with our Hamilton neighbors. However, we now want to take a step back so that the community can discuss the overall process – whether that includes our concept or not. What we do know is that a community-based visioning process is essential for the success of the Town Square property and we look forward to participating in the discussion. Sincerely, Mohammad Javanbakht Managing Member Avesta Development Group, LLC a California Limited Liability Company Email: mj@... Tel: (925) 899-8981