Draft Report to be Presented on Friday, February 10 from 8:00 to 10:30 a.m. at University Plaza Waterfront Hotel

For more information, contact: Robert Krueger at 202-624-7051; [email protected]

STOCKTON (February 6, 2012) – A panel of nationally renowned land use experts from the Urban Land Institute (ULI) is in Stockton this week to explore redevelopment opportunities for the city’s downtown. Convened through ULI’s advisory services program, the panel, sponsored by the City of Stockton, will provide recommendations and alternatives for addressing specific challenges related to the revitalization of the city’s downtown core.

The ULI advisory panel will evaluate redevelopment issues that have surfaced since its last downtown Stockton panel visit back in 1997. The City of Stockton implemented many of the initial panel’s recommendations; however, revitalization is still far from complete. ULI originally advised the city to take an aggressive approach to urban housing and the re-use of its historic structures. However, downtown Stockton still lacks an adequate supply of multi-family housing, interstitial connections, and a significant amount of private investment due to Stockton’s focus on public facilities rather than public-private partnerships. In addition, downtown Stockton has experienced significant increases in downtown office vacancies and the city-at-large has one of highest foreclosure rates in the country.

The City of Stockton specifically seeks ULI advice on:

• The type of public-private strategies that are available to support urban infill
• Ways to modify the city’s redevelopment requirements in order to enhance the viability of adaptive reuse
• Approaches to adaptively re-use four historic hotels owned by the city
• Ways to attract prospective developers and spur investment
• Steps to foster downtown revitalization given limited resources

The panelists will spend the week touring and analyzing the site while conducting up to 100 individual interviews and then spend two days framing their recommendations and drafting a report that will be presented to the public at 8:00 a.m. on Friday, February 10, 2012 at the University Plaza Waterfront Hotel.

The downtown Stockton advisory panel is chaired by David Leland, managing director of the Leland Consulting Group in Portland, Ore. Other panelists include Heather Alhadeff, senior transportation planner, Perkins Will, Atlanta, Ga.; Zachary Greene, vice president for real estate, MassDevelopment, Boston, Mass.; Kamuron Gurol, director of community development, City of Sammamish, Wash.; Scott Hall, business development coordinator, Virginia Beach Economic Development Department, Virginia Beach, Va.; Robert M. Lewis, principal and president, Development Strategies, St. Louis, Mo.; David Scheuer, president, The Retrovest Companies, Burlington, Vt.; and Ross Tilghman, director, Tilghman Group, Seattle, Wash.

Through the advisory services program, ULI assembles experts in the fields of real estate and land use planning to participate on panels worldwide, offering recommendations for complex planning and development projects, programs and policies. According to Tom Eitler, vice president of advisory services, the strength of the program lies in ULI’s unique ability to draw on the knowledge and experience of its nearly 30,000 members, including land developers, public officials, academics, lenders, architects, planners and urban designers.

This analysis from a wide variety of land use experts, coupled with substantial input from representatives of the communities, produces excellent results “time after time,” Eitler says. “The panel process helps build consensus to support an effort that benefits the entire community. It’s often the fresh, outside view provided by the panel that achieves these results. We seek possibilities and opportunities that might have been overlooked. The advisory services panel program is all about seeing things a different way.”

Past sponsors of ULI advisory services panels include: federal, state and local government agencies; regional councils of government; chambers of commerce; redevelopment authorities; private developers and property owners; community development corporations; lenders; historic preservation groups; non-profit community groups; environmental organizations; and economic development agencies.

About the Urban Land Institute
The Urban Land Institute (uli.org) is a nonprofit education and research institute supported by its members. Its mission is to provide leadership in the responsible use of land and in creating and sustaining thriving communities worldwide. Established in 1936, the Institute has nearly 30,000 members representing all aspects of land use and development disciplines.