The future owners of Japanese Village Plaza (JVP) outlined their plans to renovate the retail center during a meeting Wednesday before the Little Tokyo Community Development Advisory Committee.

Marvin Lotz, president of American Commercial Equities, reassured the committee and JVP business owners that their intention is not to tear down the center that first opened in 1980.

“No, we’re not tearing it down. No, we’re not building condos. What our vision is, is to renovate the property, remodel the property, clean the property up, put good tenants into that property, put the right mix of tenants and basically bring it back to the prominence that I’ve been told it had,” Lotz said.

“There’s so much going on in downtown and in this area and I think it’s a shame that you have a property or area like that, that could be so good and so right. But it has to be cleaned up, it has to have the right tenants. People have to know that it’s open and that all the stores are open in it.”

Escrow is set to close on the 48-unit Japanese-themed shopping center on July 31. American Commercial Equities is a Malibu-based private real estate investment company founded by B. Wayne Hughes Jr. His father, B. Wayne Hughes Sr., is founder of Public Storage who has a personal fortune in the billions.

The American Commercial Equities Web site lists more than 50 holdings in Santa Monica, Beverly Hills, Hawaii, Paso Robles and San Diego. They purchased the property from current owner Cathy Chang for an undisclosed sum and last week bought the Local Motion building on Kalakaua Avenue in Honolulu. Lotz characterized the new owners as long-term investors who are building capital for their grandchildren.

Retailers and community members have been worried since news circulated several months ago of the imminent sale of JVP. JVP is one of the cornerstones in Little Tokyo, linking First and Second streets and features the iconic Fire Tower and many longtime stores including Mikawaya, Yamazaki Bakery and Mitsuru Cafe. Recently, the plaza has attracted younger shoppers and trendy boutiques. But there has also been signs of disrepair: the plaza’s  fountain doesn’t work, and there are trees that have not been trimmed.

Bill Watanabe, Little Tokyo Service Center executive director, said that while Lotz had allayed some of the community’s fears, he is concerned about JVP’s small business owners.

“I know that people buy property to make money and that’s their business. But a lot of the stores and the character we want to maintain in Little Tokyo is the mom and pop small businesses—especially those that reflect our ethnicity, which kind of struggle to make ends meet,” Watanabe said. “So how do you think you can balance the idea that you’re still in business to be in business, but maybe helping these kinds of businesses here that are not huge profit centers and struggle to pay the rent.”

Lotz responded, “A simple answer is, if you were to take away the mom and pops, you no longer have Japanese Village. We have to give people a reason to come there. It has to be a special place. Will there be another Starbucks there? Do we see that that’s the answer, no I don’t see that Starbucks belongs everywhere.”

The sale of JVP is the latest major change in Little Tokyo that has seen a surge in new development since 2000. Among the new projects are Teramachi Senior Housing on Third and San Pedro streets, the 128-unit apartment complex Hikari on Second Street and Central Avenue and the construction currently underway on Block 8 across from the Japanese American Cultural and Community Center.

Lotz said that changes would not happen right away. He introduced Mark Hong and Kay Swikart of CB Richard Ellis, who will be managing the property. Among the specific improvements mentioned include renovating the second-story office space and cleaning the entire shopping center, with particular attention to updating the entrance on First Street.

Bruce Kaji, founder of the Japanese American National Museum, asked if the investors ever sell the property that they consider selling back to the Japanese American community.

“Little Tokyo is a result of a redevelopment area approximately seven blocks. We did that purposely because when we were evacuated (during World War II) by President Roosevelt because we were considered the enemy and put into concentration camps, we had no town, we had to leave,” Kaji stated. “We lost our farms, we lost our businesses, we lost our area. So coming back and trying to reestablish ourselves is very tough for us, we’ve come this far.”

During the meeting, several store owners expressed concerns about how much rent would increase, whether they would be given new leases and whether JVP would retain its Japanese character. The new owners said they would be meeting with individual business owners to discuss their situation.

Shinobu Maruyama, owner of Shabu Shabu House, said many tenants are scared by the possible changes.

“I’m still scared. The story is good, everything good. but the other side is, is it really true or not,” Maruyama said. “But my main concern is to keep the plaza for the future generations. I’m speaking not as a tenant but as part of the Japanese American community. For tenant it’s OK. It doesn’t matter for me, business can move other places but the village is historical.”

Nikki Ikeda of Bloom Art Gallery in JVP, said the new owners helped clear up many rumors that had circulated for the past three months. “Everything seems so good for us and good for them, except for increasing rents, but that’s business, we understand,” Ikeda said. “We would like to keep our Japanese style. We don’t want to lose our character as a Japanese community. We don’t want to have just like any other shopping mall like Beverly Center or Santa Monica Promenade. We don’t need that kind of shopping mall in Japanese Village—we need our character, our style, our history. Otherwise, no one is going to come.”

Source: The Rafu Shimpo Online, Sunday July 1, 2007