economy/dy/34″/mike1st/mark2nd DOUGLAS YOUNG Staff Reporter It’s a tale of two economies. Rising numbers of homeowners and small business owners in the San Fernando Valley are slipping into bankruptcy and foreclosure. Meanwhile, the Valley’s larger businesses and commercial landlords are actually faring better than those in other parts of L.A. Much of the two-tiered phenomenon is due to the fact that small businesses and homeowners have had more difficulty recovering from the 1994 Northridge earthquake, and their government aid has been exhausted, while larger businesses have used their greater resources to bounce back. But on a more profound level, the phenomenon reflects a basic shift in the Valley economy, according to Jack Kyser, chief economist at the Economic Development Corp. of L.A. County. That shift has been away from the defense and aerospace sectors and towards entertainment and high-tech sectors, he said. The larger Valley aerospace contractors have been downsizing for years, but many of the smaller subcontractors and job shops reliant on aerospace work have managed to hang on often surviving on unsustainable intermittent jobs and meager attempts to transition to commercial-sector work. Meanwhile, large entertainment companies have become the economic engines of the Valley, which largely explains the current strength of big business there. And those large companies will eventually spawn a new crop of ancillary businesses, just as the aerospace industry did in days gone by. But that new crop is just beginning to emerge and its early growth is still being eclipsed, statistically, by the disappearing aerospace-dependent small businesses. “I think that in the long range, the Valley will be a hotbed for small business, because you have the emergence of the entertainment and high-tech industries that draw on small business,” Kyser said. But for now, small operators are bearing the brunt of the Valley’s economic restructuring. “The economic shakeout is still continuing for individuals and small business owners in the Valley,” said David Hagen, a bankruptcy lawyer and partner at the law firm of Merritt & Hagen in Woodland Hills. “The Valley economy had a cold before the earthquake, and the earthquake caused that cold to linger a couple years longer.” The high level of small business and homeowner failures is reflected in the Valley’s relatively high rate of personal and business bankruptcy filings. About 28 percent of L.A. County Chapter 7 liquidation bankruptcy filings in February were in the Valley, even though the Valley only has 14 percent of the county’s population, according to the Central District of California Bankruptcy Court. About 24 percent of L.A. County Chapter 13 personal bankruptcy filings in February were in the Valley, also far more than its portion of the county’s population. Hagen blamed the Northridge earthquake for the Valley’s disproportionate bankruptcy woes. He said the earthquake produced an initial round of bankruptcies, as businesses and homeowners struggled to make costly repairs to their properties after the quake struck. Since then, many who survived thanks to infusions of federal and local aid have again run into problems, as government funds stopped flowing over the past year. “The earthquake money has run through the system, so a lot of people who were hurt in the earthquake and got money (that helped them get by) are starting to hurt again,” he said. Similar to bankruptcy filings, the proportion of Valley mortgage foreclosures is larger than L.A. County as a whole, based on population. In January, there were 531 home mortgage foreclosures per 1 million residents in the Valley, compared with only 313 foreclosures per 1 million residents in L.A. County as a whole, according to Experian, a real estate research firm. Some of the foreclosures could be due to the preponderance of condominiums in the Valley and the major damage suffered by many of those units in the Northridge quake, said John Marquis, an executive vice president at TransWorld Bank in Sherman Oaks. “The earthquake had a major effect on condos because many were underinsured, and the folks didn’t have the financial wherewithal to fix them up. The owners’ associations were deciding what to do, and in many cases, they’ve decided to walk away from their units,” he said. He added that the foreclosure phenomenon began shortly after the earthquake and continues today. Meanwhile, Valley hotel room and occupancy rates both lag slightly about 2 percent behind L.A. County, according to Bruce Baltin, a senior vice president at PKF Consulting. “The Valley gets a strong business demand (for hotel rooms), but it doesn’t have a strong tourist demand,” said Baltin, adding that the Valley’s only major tourist draw is Universal Studios. “A lot of the hotels in (other parts of) L.A. are in areas that get a strong mix of tourist and commercial business.” While the Valley’s small business and homeowner sectors are underperforming the rest of L.A. County, the region’s industrial and office tenants appear to be bouncing back more strongly than their counterparts elsewhere in the county. Within that commercial realm, the Valley’s sizable industrial sector has been a major force pulling the region out of the economic doldrums. According to Department of Water and Power statistics, the Valley currently has about 44 percent of all industrial electric accounts in the City of L.A., disproportionately large compared with its 36 percent share of the population. Within that base, the first-quarter vacancy rate for industrial space stood at 6.7 percent, outpacing the 6.9 percent rate for downtown and central L.A., 7.1 percent for the Mid-Cities area and 6.9 percent for the South Bay, according to Grubb & Ellis Co. Industrial tenants are being attracted to the Valley by reasonable rents, low land prices and a relative abundance of large tracts of industrially zoned land, said Ron Feder, managing principal at Lee & Associates of Sherman Oaks. Feder said land prices of $9 to $12 per square foot in some parts of the Valley (compared with $20 on the Westside), coupled with strong demand for new space, have spurred new industrial development in Sylmar, Pacoima, Van Nuys, Chatsworth, Northridge and Calabasas. In the office sector, the Valley also continues to outpace the rest of L.A. County in the strength of its recovery. The Valley’s overall office vacancy rate of 11.9 percent is the best of any regional submarket in L.A. County, according to Grubb & Ellis. By comparison, the second strongest market L.A.’s Westside posted a first-quarter vacancy rate of 14.3 percent, while central L.A. posted a rate of 18.4 percent and the South Bay came in at 20.9 percent. The strong recovery of the Valley’s office market owes largely to the booming entertainment industry in Burbank, Glendale and Universal City, some of which has spilled over into the Central and West Valley, said Jeff Woolf, president at Lee & Associates. “The entertainment business is the occupancy juggernaut that drives down vacancy rates and drives up occupancy rates in the Valley,” said Woolf. He added that the explosive growth of businesses in the East Valley where the office vacancy rate is 5.3 percent has been the biggest factor leading recovery in the Valley office market. Woolf also noted that suburban office markets in general, with their newer facilities and closer proximity to executives’ homes, have also fared better nationwide in recent years than more-traditional downtown central business districts.

valley econowatch/dy/mike1st/mark2nd After bottoming out last October, Valley home prices appear to be inching their way back in this month’s issue of Valley Econowatch. However, that upward movement will be kept in check for the foreseeable future by a steady stream of foreclosed homes still coming onto the market, according to Valley real estate experts. The nascent turnaround is reflected in Econowatch’s repeat home sales price index over the last three months. The index is compiled by Experian, which calculates the prices that homes sell for compared with what they would have sold for in the benchmark year of 1990, when the index equaled 100. The most recent repeat home sales index of 73.6, for January, means a home that sold for $100,000 on Jan. 1, 1990 would sell for $73,600 in the present market. After declining for much of the past year, the repeat home sales index appears to have bottomed out last September at a 68.9. Since that time, the index has been inching back up. Much of the boost in the index is coming from home sales in the $200,000-and-under range, according to Mel Wilson, owner of residential real estate brokerage Mel Wilson & Associates of Northridge. “We’ve been getting multiple offers on properties below the $200,000 range in the last five months. Below $200,000 is where it’s happening,” Wilson said. As an example he cited the case of a $110,000 bank-owned house that he sold less than two weeks ago. Two offers were made on the property within three days of it coming on the market, both below the asking price. When the two prospective buyers found out they were bidding against each other, both raised their offers to the asking price. “The (houses) that are in good condition and less than $200,000 are probably staying on the market less than 30 days now,” said Wilson. By comparison, the same homes would have stayed on the market closer to 90 days a year ago, he added. Wilson said brisk activity in the $200,000-and-under range could also breathe some life into the $250,000-to-$500,000 home range later this year, as trade-up buyers sell their cheaper homes and move up to more expensive units. He predicted the Valley home price index will continue to inch its way up in 1997, gaining as much as 5 percent for the year. But the larger number of bank-owned properties still coming onto the market should keep the index from breaking the 5 percent barrier, Wilson added. “Over 20 percent of our sales are still foreclosure properties, and that’s dragging down prices. According to the big institutions, there’s still lot of material in the foreclosures loop that’s not on the market yet,” he said. Douglas Young

schmidt/jb/8 inches/1stjc/mark2nd For Nancy Schmidt, charity work is a family tradition. Growing up in Panorama City, Schmidt recalls how her mother remained involved in the Panorama City Women’s Club and her grandmother volunteered time for the Business and Professional Women’s Association. “I grew up knowing that charity work was just part of life,” said Schmidt, a vice president and manager of American Pacific State Bank in Sherman Oaks. “It was natural for me to stay involved with my community, and my entire family continues to be involved.” Schmidt, a 48-year-old Chatsworth resident, carried on the tradition by starting the San Fernando Valley Charitable Foundation. Her efforts led to her winning the 1997 Fernando Award, which honors Valley residents who demonstrate community leadership. About 200 people attended a black-tie reception and dinner in her honor March 13. Schmidt, a former school teacher, has been president and chief executive officer of the Valley charitable foundation since 1991. The charity raises about $40,000 each year to benefit numerous community organizations from AIDs charities to homeless shelters, she said. “She has a lot of energy, and really was the perfect choice for this award,” said Lee Kanon Alpert, president of Fernando Award Inc. “Routinely she goes above and beyond, and that’s what this award is all about.” A Chatsworth resident, Schmidt has also been president of the Universal City-North Hollywood and Sherman Oaks chambers of commerce. In addition, she has served as a board member for the North Hollywood Medical Center, the San Fernando Valley Economic Alliance, and the Valley Industry Commerce Association. “I was honored to get this award,” Schmidt said. “But, this is just something I do. Some people golf in their spare time, and I spend my time raising money for charities.” Joe Bel Bruno

VAL/INTERVIEW/1stjc/mark2nd By WADE DANIELS Contributing Reporter Cal State Northridge President Blenda J. Wilson is credited with successfully guiding the university through perhaps its greatest crisis the Jan. 17, 1994 earthquake that damaged most of its major buildings and threatened cancellation of the spring semester. Wilson marshaled near- and far-flung contacts to find temporary classroom structures so school could continue. Now the school faces another crisis. It’s called “Tidal Wave II” and it refers to the crush of children of Baby Boomers reaching their college years. In fact, the wave has already hit CSUN, Wilson says, with so many applications submitted for fall that the school stopped accepting them in mid-March rather than the usual June or July (current enrollment is 26,104). As this takes place, CSUN and other public schools are grappling with a projected decline of funds for public education over the next 10 years, from about 10 percent of the state’s general fund to about 5 percent. In strategizing to ease this funding squeeze, CSUN plans to lease 20 of 65 underused acres it owns north of campus to a developer who would build a 220,000 square-foot shopping complex called University MarketCenter. Wilson says the project will yield the university about $1 million a year in usable funds at virtually no risk. Question: You wrote recently that the MarketCenter development will retain business being lost to other upscale developments in places like Pasadena and Santa Monica. Why is that? Answer: Santa Monica and Pasadena are developing more responsive ways of attracting business to their communities. The kinds of tenants that our developer has talked to about locating on the north campus are very desirable tenants. Q: Such as? A: The example that has been used is something like a Bristol Farms or something like an OfficeMax or Office Depot. We cannot be specific about names because they’re not willing to sign contracts until they know we’re going to build. The issue is, if they don’t come here they will go to other towns or parts of the Valley that are trying to attract them. Most of the stores in the Reseda corridor, other than large supermarkets, are stores that are 1,500 or 2,500, perhaps 10,000 square feet, max. We’re talking about the anchor tenants (at MarketCenter) being in facilities that are 25,000 to 50,000 square feet. There is not that kind of land available on Reseda at all other than the land we have. Q: Some merchants along the Reseda Corridor are still concerned that this will not benefit them and might hurt them. After dozens of meetings about the project, has the gap narrowed? A: What I’ve been reading in letters to the editor or people who are quoted, is about a half dozen voices … and I don’t think it’s unfair to say that their opinions are strong and they have presented them frequently and in a public way. Last Thursday or Friday, the United Chambers (of the San Fernando Valley) group had a discussion where they asked that we do more planning around the project, and even that was a 19 to 14 vote with four people abstaining. So it was not a uniform majority of the United Chambers groups. I don’t dispute that there’s an impression that there’s a considerable amount of opposition. But our analysis suggests that it really is quite localized around a few issues, the environmental impact being most important, and to a certain extent a fear within the retail community that this would be competitive with existing business. Q: I spoke with a professor on campus here who suggested that it is an odd way for a state educational institution to raise money by leasing out state land for a retail center. What do you say to that? A: I think it does seem odd to people in Northridge and perhaps to people who have been in California for a long time, where for the most part until very recently the state was able to provide very generous resources for higher education. California has been advantaged for many years in its growth of an exquisite higher education system based almost entirely on state funds. If you were to go any place else in the United States, you would find that the development of university-owned land for a variety of purposes, including income which is what our development is about is not at all uncommon or new. The question is, when you have a very rapidly increasing enrollment demand and an almost certain decline in state resources, what are your alternatives? One is to raise student fees, which the public has said they don’t want to do. Another is to do private fund raising, which we and every other institution are going to do in a more professional serious way. And the third is to use what investment people call “idle assets,” and these are idle and ugly assets which have remained idle and ugly for 40 years while people speculate about what might be a wonderful thing to build on the land with resources the university doesn’t have. Q: CSUN has the fifth largest business school in the nation, with more than 5,000 undergraduates and a few hundred graduate students. Is there any customizing of the curriculum or programs to suit local needs? A: What I know is that in the last couple of years the school of business and economics has done a strategic plan analyzing their program in relation to the needs of major industries that graduates would be likely to enter. The most immediate, interesting and I hope fruitful such example is a collaboration between the College of Business and Economics, the College of Engineering and Computer Science and the College of Arts, Media and Communication. (This would) identify all of the post-high school and community college career lines, jobs and positions that would be required by the entertainment industry, since we see that as the anchor industry, if you will, by comparison with defense and aerospace in years past. The three colleges actually were meeting today with the human resource people from DreamWorks to make sure that the curriculum that is designed for our entertainment institute reflects the kind of training and kind of skills that DreamWorks and other companies see a need for. Q: While we’re talking about keeping the university in touch with the community’s needs, I’m told you host salons at your house. A: I host about four a year with a provocative speaker to spark conversation, and everything is off the record and non-partisan. They are contemporary issues rather than educational issues, per se. For example, we had a discussion recently about Valley secession and invited legislators, community leaders and obviously faculty and students, some alumni. Q: In the long wake of the 1994 Northridge earthquake, I see that CSUN is still operating with a fair number of bungalows such as the one we’re sitting in, your office. Is the study process still impeded by the damage? A: No. The educational process is not impeded at all. If anything, it has been enhanced because those aspects of the university that required specialized equipment or laboratories or technology have been repaired at a higher level of state of the art than they were before. Q: For example? A: We’ve wired all of our buildings that have been repaired with fiber optic cables so computer access is available where it wasn’t before. In our business education complex our classrooms are smart classrooms, with video and television monitors and the ability for faculty members to use … overhead projection as they teach. Q: There’s a good deal of attention to your performance here at CSUN from your peers in the academic world. Apparently, there is talk that farther on down the road you might end up administering an Ivy League school. A: (Laughs) No. I don’t think so. I worked at an Ivy League school, I worked at Harvard for 10 years as the associate dean for the graduate school of education, so I know what that’s like. My personal commitment as an educator is to comprehensive urban universities.. I mean large multi-purpose universities that have large undergraduate programs and some graduate programs and an age range of 16 to 80, with programs that are pure research, basic research as well as applied research…. All of those things I like about Cal State Northridge. SPOTLIGHT: Profile: Blenda J. Wilson Snapshot: Position: President of California State University at Northridge Born: Perth Amboy, N.J., 1941 Education: Ph.D, Higher Education Administration, Boston College, 1979; Institute for Educational Management, Harvard Business School, 1970; M.A., Education, Seton Hall University, 1965; B.A., English, Secondary Education, Cedar Crest College, 1962 Most Admired Person: Her mother, Margaret Wilson. “If my mother were born in a later generation she would have been the president of the United States.” Personal: Married, no children

chick btl/d.taub/1stjc If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em. That was the feeling of L.A. City Councilmember Laura Chick, who early this month announced her intention to lead a team of investors to buy the Los Angeles Dodgers. An earlier proposal to sell shares in the team to fans didn’t go far Major League Baseball doesn’t allow it so Chick said she would buy the team along with former baseball Commissioner Peter Ueberroth, filmmaker Steven Spielberg and real estate magnate Eli Broad. “I’ve learned a great deal in recent months about how the almighty dollar rules,” Chick said in a press release. “I’ve therefore decided, ‘If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em’ and worked hard to put together the best possible group of really wealthy investors.” The councilmember, who represents a portion of the southwest San Fernando Valley, also proposed changing the baseball team’s name to “the Chicks.” The date of Chick’s announcement? April 1.

A PRIMER FOR GOING INTO BUSINESS WITH THE GOVERNMENT By Ruth Ann Chao Businesses and non-profit organizations are going into business with the government more frequently every day. As federal, state, county and municipal governments continue to seek ways to maintain their levels of services while reducing their expenses, the use of public/private partnerships is becoming increasingly popular. There are many forms of public/private partnerships used. The form of the partnership is generally chosen based on the level of control the governmental entity wants to retain, the source of any capital investment required, and the general nature of the joint venture sought. Privatization through public/private partnerships have been used in a wide variety of areas: highways/bridges, airports, railways, water supply and wastewater treatment, solid waste collection and disposal, recycling, energy production and distribution, administrative services, correctional facilities, business loan programs, and social services. Some of the more common forms of joint venture agreements dealing with development or use of facilities and services are: Private Contract A public agency retains control over a physical plant but contracts with a private organization for staffing and managing the facility. Its been estimated that there is an increase in efficiency of 10 to 30 percent. Unfortunately, this type of arrangement is often subject to labor disputes because the government workers are not kept on. To alleviate this problem another type of privatization has been developed called managed competition. Turnkey A public agency contracts with a private organization to build a facility for a fixed price. The private partner agrees to take the risk of cost over-runs and retains the right to savings generated by private sector procurement and construction efficiencies. Specific criteria for the facility are set out in advance of the project build out. Financing and ownership can fall to either the public or private partner. If the initial financing capital is provided by the private partner then, generally, a long term services contract is also awarded in order to enable the private partner to recoup its initial investment. Ownership of the facility remains with the government. The public agency must take care in how it begins the process. When a turnkey contract is announced to the public at the conclusion of the negotiations, it appears biased. However, when general proposals are requested from the public and then a single private organization is selected for negotiation based on overall qualifications with no guarantee until a final agreement is reached, this obstacle is overcome. Build-Operate-Transfer/Build-Transfer-Operate This is a Turnkey joint venture with a twist. The private partner will build the facility to the specifications set by the public agency but rather than the government retaining ownership of the facility, the ownership is initially held by the private partner and then transferred to the public agency either upon completion of the facility or at the end of a set franchise period during which the private partner has an exclusive contract to provide the user services required. When the transfer takes place depends on tax, liability, initial capitalization and other issues. This has become a common means for a public agency to obtain facilities and services through leveraging private capital to serve public needs and policy. There are even more variations on this theme with the use of tax exempt leases, the purchase and renovation of existing facilities, and sale and leaseback to shift risk into the private sector. Public/Private Partnerships are one aspect of the general move toward privatization of government services. Privatization also includes: – Asset sales – The sale of buildings or equipment to private organizations Contracting – The purchase of defined services but the responsibility for policy and management of the services is retained by the public agency and the public agency continues to pay for the services. – Divestiture – The sale of commercial type functions to private parties. The government retains no control or responsibility for the function once sold. – Internal Franchising – A specific department within one public agency sells its services (usually administrative) to other public agencies rather than duplicating efforts – External Franchising – Private vendors are given contracts to provide services to specific users and the users pay the private vendors directly. – Managed Competition – The public workers in an area of government service are assisted in organizing to put together a bid to compete with private providers of the same service. If the public workers obtain the contract they are held to the same standards for quality, cost, and efficiency as the private providers. Sometimes, special arrangements are made for contract renewal in the case of public workers, e.g., three contract renewals in the competitive process is rewarded with a longer term contract than would be awarded to the private provider. – Outsourcing – The public agency contracts with an outside provider for the performance of services but maintains complete control over the management decisions. Any fees paid, continue to be paid to the public agency. The private sector is becoming more aggressive in pursuing partnership opportunities, often instigating the project by approaching public agencies with proposals. Given the necessarily conservative approach public agencies take in evaluating these proposals, successful private organizations usually demonstrate special expertise and prior success in the field. However, there is a push from the federal level down to encourage public agencies to identify potential opportunities for privatization through public/private partnerships to obtain the efficiency of the private sector in the provision of traditionally government provided services. This push is resulting in smaller projects that are less technically demanding being considered on more local levels. Where the private partners in these joint ventures were almost exclusively long established firms in specialized technical fields, the spectrum of opportunity continues to broaden. -30- Ruth Ann Chao is a partner in the law firm of McLain-Hill, Cornwell, Chao & Schropp.

entcol.add/turner/jc NBC get the nod Some residents concerned about traffic weren’t happy about it, but the Burbank City Council last month unanimously approved a planned 1.9 million-square-foot expansion by NBC Studios. NBC is expected to begin contruction on the first phase of its expansion as early as December. Plans call for a 15-story office tower along California Street, a parking garage and six sound stages. The rest of the project will be built in phases, with construction expected to finish within the next 20 years. In all, the studio has proposed to add four 15-story office towers, six sound stages and three underground parking garages however, two of the towers and one garage will only be built if NBC can find a long-term tenant to occupy them. Studio officials said the project, when completed, might result in the addition of up to 3,000 full-time and contract employees at the NBC Studios facility. It is also expected to bring traffic. According to an environmental report, the expanded studios will generate 15,500 daily vehicle trips, compared to the 6,300 daily vehicle trips currently generated by NBC. Before approval was granted, NBC agreed to make street improvements that city planners say will mitigate most of the problems.

gmplant/22″/mike1st/mark2nd By WADE DANIELS Contributing Reporter Six anchor tenants and a fast-food restaurant operator are in final negotiations to lease space in the $100 million retail/industrial project proposed for the former site of the General Motors assembly plant in Van Nuys. The project, now dubbed “The Plant,” is expected to include Office Max, Home Depot and Babies ‘R’ Us, a subsidiary chain of Toys ‘R’ Us, according to knowledgeable sources. The sources say a McDonald’s restaurant and an Arco gas station/mini-mart are also likely to locate in the center. Public hearings on the project are scheduled to begin this month. Because the center is seen as an economic boon for the area, city officials are expecting little opposition. “There are a number of very good tenants vying for the spaces, and we expect these to be decent-paying jobs,” said Los Angeles City Councilman Richard Alarcon, who has worked to get the GM site redeveloped ever since the 2,500-employee plant shut down in 1992. “The GM facility was a symbol of the economic health of the area, and the fact that the site is under development is a symbol that the Valley has recovered.” Dan Selleck of Selleck Properties declined comment on the progress of negotiations, citing the pending city approval process. But one of the sources said the developers have largely filled the center, “all except for the leases being signed.” “The square footage for the various spaces is even worked out for most of them,” the source said. Spokesmen for Office Max and Home Depot, two expected anchor tenants, said final lease agreements had not been signed and declined comment. The 100-acre GM site has been designed to accommodate 356,000 square feet of new retail space on the 36-acre western portion of the property (on the 8000 block of Van Nuys Boulevard). That retail space is tentatively slated to be occupied by five restaurants, two food courts, six major anchor tenants and a gasoline station. As the round of hearings begins, community members say they will voice concerns over the application for an “off-site” alcoholic beverage license for a proposed gas station mini-mart. An off-site license allows the store to sell alcoholic beverages for consumption off the premises. As planned, the station would be built on Van Nuys Boulevard adjacent to Blythe Street, where police have long battled illegal drug sales and other criminal activity. “We don’t oppose liquor licenses as a rule, but we have a problem with this off-site license as it’s right across from Blythe Street, which is notorious for its law enforcement problems,” said Don Schultz, a member of Alarcon’s task force on the project and president of the Van Nuys Homeowners Association. Schultz said there is also concern over the possibility that a Home Depot would become a magnet for day laborers. However, he said, the homeowners’ association will not lodge any challenges to the Home Depot because the expected inclusion of a police station or sub-station at the development “will discourage this from being a problem.” Five acres of the project site have been set aside for a police station, which must still be approved by the City Council. An Office of Zoning Administration staff report recommends that the developer’s request to move forward with the project and to obtain on- and off-site alcoholic beverage licenses be approved. The developer is S & V; Van Nuys Associates, a company formed by The Voit Cos. of Woodland Hills and Westlake Village-based Selleck Properties. The developer previously announced that Mann Theatres will build a 16-screen cinema complex with 3,700 seats. “The fact that Selleck and Voit want to come and develop the 60 vacant acres means a lot for the community; it shows there is massive potential for the area,” said Nancy Hoffman, executive vice president of the Van Nuys Chamber of Commerce. “The area seems to be in a comeback.” Alarcon said he is most excited about the prospect of the 2,000 new jobs the development is expected to bring. “The GM facility was a symbol of the economic health of the area, and the fact that the site is under development is a symbol that the Valley has recovered,” Alarcon said. In recognition of the site’s history, The Plant’s shopping and restaurant facilities are designed around a car-and-parts-factory motif. The eastern portion of the site has been designed to accommodate 600,000 square feet of new industrial space on 30 acres.

Correx/april/ sfvbj/ms/1stjc The names of several firms were misspelled in the March issue’s list of largest law firms in the San Fernando Valley. The firms’ correct names are: Rushfeldt, Shelley & Drake; Hemar Rousso Garwacki; Karno, Schwartz, Friedman, Shafron & Warren; Greenberg & Bass; Pearlman, Boeska & Wax; and Schimmel, Hillshafer & Loewenthal. The number of full-time professionals employed by Vasin Heyn & Co. was misstated in the February issue’s list of the largest accounting firms in the San Fernando Valley. The firm employs three full-time accounting professionals, two of whom are CPAs

entcol/turner/23″/mike1st/mark2nd During last month’s Academy Awards show, thousands of Americans headed to the fridge or to the bathroom during the exact same moment: When they were giving out the Oscar for best sound in a motion picture. For those who missed it, the team responsible for the audio portion of “The English Patient” won the prize. What’s that? You mean you still don’t care? It isn’t the most glamorous activity in Hollywood, and it’s far too technical for a segment on “Entertainment Tonight,” but the sound business is a critical component of show business and represents an important piece of the San Fernando Valley’s network of entertainment industry services. The dozens of sound companies in the Valley do everything from creating special audio effects to re-dubbing dialogue to supplying music for movies, TV shows, CD-ROMs, commercials, music videos and any other kind of filmed content. It’s a more interesting business than it sounds. Most people think of them as technicians, but the sound engineers who make movies as pleasing to the ears as to the eyes are often artists in their own right. “I don’t consider myself a technician, I consider myself a filmmaker,” said Richard L. Anderson, owner of Weddington Productions Inc. in North Hollywood. “I approach things from a drama point of view, from the standpoint of, ‘What should the audience be feeling in this scene?’ ” The creation of a film’s soundtrack involves a tremendous amount of editing and mixing, with much of the work done on computers. Sound effects are usually created by taking the actual item making the desired sound say, a car or motorcycle engine and slowing the original down, or layering it with a variety of other noises. As an example, Anderson (who was nominated this year for sound effects editing in the film “Daylight”) points to the work he did for the film “Raiders of the Lost Ark.” For one scene, in which Indiana Jones is in a fight/chase scene on a moving truck, Anderson mixed the sound of a lion roaring with the sound of the revving engines to instill in the audience a subliminal feeling of danger. Movie gunshots are almost always enhanced as well, because actual guns don’t make the booming sound audiences have come to expect. “You fire a .45-caliber automatic, and it just kind of goes ‘crack’ on the recording,” Anderson said. Sound editors slow down the actual gunshot sound to make it deeper. Sound effects are often created in special studios using a process called “Foley,” named after sound effects pioneer Jack Foley. Sound engineers beat slabs of beef to simulate a man getting punched, for example, or come up with other creative ways to make more-appealing sounds to replace the sounds that were recorded in the original filming. “There are times when we sit on the Foley stage with cold oatmeal to make ‘glorpy’ sounds,” said Bill Koepnick, president and co-owner of Burbank-based Advantage Audio Inc., which specializes in producing soundtracks for animated TV shows or videos. “It’s a constant challenge to come up with sounds that are new and funny.” Sound effects are only one aspect of the sound game. Another frequent activity at sound editing studios is a process called Automatic Dialogue Replacement (actually, if you’re in the biz, you just say “ADR”). In the ADR process, actors re-record dialogue that was flubbed during the original filming session, or that was ruined by background noises. One of the quirkier niches is occupied by special music libraries like the Southern Library of Recorded Music in Toluca Lake, where Roy Kohn has been running a one-man shop since 1963. Kohn has access to a vast collection of tunes that sound almost but not quite like well-known music from a variety of genres. In the sound business, it’s known as “source” music. For example, say a director is filming a scene in a bar and somebody turns on the jukebox. The director wants a sort of ’60s-ish, Beatles-esque song to come out, but he doesn’t want to pay for the rights to use an actual Beatles recording. So Southern Library provides a song recorded by a group that sounds like the Beatles, singing a tune that isn’t quite as well-known as a Beatles song. In one episode of the TV series “The Wonder Years,” two characters are having a fight in a car and they keep changing the radio station. The Southern Library provided about nine different songs for that scene, in addition to all the jukebox music in the TV series “Northern Exposure.” The Southern Library, which is owned by New York-based Peer Music International, gets its music from libraries in Europe, which contract with songwriters and unknown recording artists to grow their collections, Kohn said. “Our music is unknown commercially, but it sounds good on background and doesn’t take away from the dialogue going on,” Kohn said. Hollywood’s recent production boom is fueling the Valley’s sound companies, many of which are adding staff. But the major film studios are taking some of the wind out of the sails of smaller players; although most of the studios got out of the sound business in the mid-1980s, in recent years they have been re-creating in-house sound departments. So companies like Weddington Productions these days have to rely almost exclusively on independent movie and TV producers. “We seem to be doing OK so far,” said Anderson. “As the Academy Awards pointed out, there’s always a lot of independents.”