The Innovation Center @ Brentwood

The Innovation Center @ Brentwood Outreach Report

2Consultant Team

Outreach Overview

Virtual Town Halls

Joint Council/PC Workshop

CoUrbanize Surveys

Public Stakeholders

Landowners

Developer Interviews

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4

5

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Contents

Outreach Overview & Process

The outreach process for The Innovation Center @ Brentwood aims to gather insight from a broad representation of the com-munity to inform planning, political, design, and financial strate-gies to guide the project forward.

To date, our process has included the following outreach efforts:• Two Virtual Town Hall meetings • Joint City Council / Planning Commission Virtual Town Hall #1• CoUrbanize Project Website Surveys • Public Stake Holder Interviews • Landowner Interviews • Developer Interviews

Next Steps in our outreach include: • Virtual Town Hall #3 • Public Stakeholder review of Catalyst sites• Landowner review of master plan and Catalyst sites • Joint City Council / Planning Commission Virtual Town Hall #2

As the diagram to the left indicates, our master plan and imple-mentation strategy will only be successful if the four primary groups see benefit in the master plan vision AND the implementa-tion policies to support it.

Overview

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Community

Considerations

Landowner

Considerations

Employer

Considerations

Developer

Considerations

MASTER PLAN OPTIONS

MASTER PLAN OPTIONS

OUTREACH REPORTINNOVATION CENTER AT BRENTWOOD

Community Outreach: Virtual Town Halls

Virtual Tools: Due to Covid considerations our community outreach has utilized a virtual format using ZOOM video conferencing and the City Brent-wood WebEx System as well as the CoUrbanize Interactive Project Website.

Virtual Town Hall 1:Virtual Town Hall #1 introduced the community to the project goals, context, and the results of our S.W.O.T. Analysis. It also allowed our team an opportunity to hear from the public their concerns, excite-ment and ideas to be incorporated into the project.

Comments: • Traffic on Highway 4 - is it wide enough?• Number of residential units planned • Number of people on the site envisioned • Is the EIR going to be revisited? • Market and brand strengths, agriculture • How will the approach from Highway 4 be enhanced with the

“Brentwood Brand” physically • Need job centers, not residential • Closeness to recreation - Celebrate work and play • What type of jobs?• Academic and Med research • Pharma and Biotech looking for large, affordable space • Zoning needs to allow for Biotech• How does this project benefit Brentwood? • Schooling - Policing - Fire Protection - Child Care how are these

services adequately addressed?• Is there too much office proposed here? Are there prospects

already? Is this going to be a ghost town?• Is this work being done in sync with the planning department? • Is this project taking into consideration of the whole of Brent-

wood? • Visual standards? Welcoming atmosphere? Mandate for parklike

setting? • Construction time-line

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Virtual Town Hall 2:Virtual Town Hall #2 introduced the community to four master plan options for the overall site. The presentation covered planning prin-ciples, land use, connectivity, features unique and common to the master plan concepts, and design influences from financial, landown-er and developer perspectives.

Comments: • Brentwood should consider a City wide parking and transporta-

tion strategy - consider how land can be used efficiently • Can the buildings be taller to reduce the impacts of suburban

sprawl? 2 stories seems like a dated concept • The designs need to be careful crossing property lines as various

land-owners may not agree on the same price for the land - is the City going to assist buying out parcels?

• Excitement for Concept A • Concern that retail vacancies in adjoining centers will impact

success or ability to recruit development • Concerned about expanse of parking lots and lack of shade• Highway 4 expansion? • High density housing needs to come with expansion of schools • Traffic Calming? Concern about speeding • Bart and mass transit is planned, but is it realistic? Anytime soon?• Is the City looking for mixed-use, vertical or horizontal? • Will restaurants or retail be added to Brentwood? • Bart parking lot is planned near Jeffery Way - Concern about

homelessness, Bart traffic and proximity to homes • How is Bart parking fore casted? • What is the unit count of the housing proposed? What is the

anticipated population?• How will the narrowing of concepts occur for City Council? • Concern about Concept C - who would like to walk along a noisy

freeway - sound wall problematic • What are developers looking for? • What specific businesses are planned or City in talks with? • Why are we not showing plan indicated in Specific Plan?• Concept C - does this frontage matter as much here?

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Joint City Council & Planning Commission Workshop #1:A joint workshop with the City Planning Commission and City Coun-cil provided an opportunity for City leadership to check-in with our team progress and direction, and provide guidance in our efforts moving forward. Project research, planning principles, concept plans and financial research were presented. Comments (short-ened) from City Leadership and Public are as follows:

Planning Commission and Council Person Comments: • How is the pandemic changing the scope of this project, is your

data working from Covid or pre-covid?• How will 5G effect how the Innovation Center will develop? • What are production occupations? • Are we advocating more cell towers? Are they required? • Multiple Property owners and parcel geometry create complex-

ity, how do you recommend how to address this? Each property owner wants their own special deal, what is the solution to that?

• Can Byron Airport expand? • Are we going to face a huge push back on this project? People

like Brentwood to remain small, will this project be supported? • Is there a plan b if we continue on the “work from home” trend• What is the time-line for essential infrastructure - Sand Creek

Road, Emergency Services? • How many warm bodies do you have per square foot, how many

more people in that area? Highway 4 bypass gets backed up, are we expanding highway 4? Traffic is at C,D and E levels

• Concern about Bart parking on East side for crime issues - don’t increase crime

• Bishop Ranch is not a good fit for Brentwood - no charm or big city sprawl - are we going to incorporate the ag heritage? De-signed with historical town in mind. Don’t turn us into San Ra-mon

• Homeless encampments at Bart Station • Lifestyle component is appealing - Mokelumne Bridge, pad-

dle-boarding, boat, regional parks in close distance - big on health - employees need to be healthy and happy and have recreation close to work

Community Outreach: Planning Commission and City Council Workshop #1

• How close is our freight train access and deep water access (An-tioch)? This will be an important amenity for employers

• Impact on Covid 19 - Will this change the scope and size of this project? Will this scale down the size of this project? Are we going to end up with empty spaces?

• What is planned for the utility lines? • Are we planning any landmarks for this projects? Is this planned

for? • 73 million dollar deficit - is this on top of the improvements al-

ready planned? • Is the price the landowners are asking for their parcels reason-

able? Are any of the landowners not willing to participate in this becoming a business center?

• Can this be considered a free trade zone? Does the presence of the Byron Airport and Deep Water ports in Antioch make this possible?

• Have you reached out to Discovery Builders on the parcel south of Old Sand Creek Road

Comments from the Public: • Concerned about the sizes and shapes of parcels - need nice

rectangular shapes• Need to respect property lines in master plan area, there have

not yet been any meetings between property owners to resolve where the master plan crosses existing parcels

• Innovation Center Vision should be optional and not change the PA1 Specific Plan

• Area south of Empire Avenue should maintain high density resi-dential to support Streets of Brentwood

• Rents projected are very high for office space• I don’t think any owners are interested in selling• Be sure to reach out to landowners prior to next stage of the

project• Pay attention to proposed Vacaville Biotech Center / Bioprocess-

ing plan - the partnership between academia, city and private sector are a potential model for the Innovation Center

• Price of construction is not coming down. Rents are! No devel-oper is going to do any speculative development unless land is given away.

• We need residential to fund the losses on the commercial zoning• We believe there will be much less use of office space due to

Covid. • Bart may never come to be in Brentwood - Can’t bet on it• Make sense to keep commercial development on the bypass, we

don’t need it off of Shady Willow. Don’t change the zoning.


WWW.InnovateBrentwood.site Surveys Our project website serves multiple functions. From it we can issue updates on project progress, public meeting announcements, provide access to all of our video presentations, download plans, reports and studies, and perhaps most importantly post questions and surveys to the community. The website also provides analytics on the percentage of positive, neutral and negative feedback. In the following pages you will see the results of a number of survey ques-tions about the project and the schemes. This effort will be ongoing through the course of the project, then, following the design effort, the City will take over administration of the website.

Community Outreach: CoUrbanize Project Website Surveys


Public Stakeholder Outreach In additions to weekly meetings with the City, outreach interviews with Public Works, East Contra Costa Fire District, Bart, and Tri Delta Transit were conducted to better understand site area opportu-nities & constraints, agency needs to support area improvements, logic and process behind design decisions made in the Specific Plan process, preferences for development details and master plan de-sign direction. Through these interviews we better understood what was and was not possible in the placement of streets, buildings, Bart and Bus facilities.

East Contra Costa Fire District Our interview with the East Contra Costa Fire District covered issues from existing service capacity, design standards, building heights, response times and the impact of additional development in Brent-wood. Key Take-Aways from our conversation: • No additional development is possible within the PA1 Specific

Plan Area until a Fire Station is built and additional staff is added to the agency

• Buildings are limited to two stories in height unless new equip-ment with aerial access (ladder truck) is provided

• Be sure to reference design standards for fire truck access • Fire service is a great concern to the community and has signifi-

cant political significance.

City of Brentwood Public Works Department In our interview with Public Works several planning concepts prelim-inary to the Town Hall plans were presented for discussion. These conversations revealed a great deal of information regarding what was and was not possible in the planning of streets, bridges, and bike, pedestrian facilities. Key Take-Aways from our conversation:• Sand Creek Road Extension to Heidorn Ranch Road already

planned and critical to development planned in Antioch - best to work with existing designs of both road extensions

Community Outreach: Public Stake Holder Interviews

• Extension of Jeffery Way south of Empire Way received positive-ly - would require reactivating the eastern segment of Old Sand Creek Road to traffic.

• Must be very judicious regarding bridges over aqueducts and Sand Creek. City currently only planning one bridge across Sand Creek. Additional crossings will require additional funding sourc-es.

• Strong preference for Ped/Bike/Car facilities to be designed with a slight vertical separation - with peds at the highest, cars at the lowest.

• Important to consider maintenance considerations - how does a street sweeper clean cycle tracks - etc.

• Limitations of future development based on existing services

BART - Ebart Extension Discussions with Bart took place over two interviews. One with the district representative Mark Foley, and the second with the project team responsible for the EBart Planning and Mokelumne Station Platform Concept. Key Take-Aways from our conversation:• The location for the Future Ebart platform is set just south of

the soon to be constructed Mokelumne Bridge. This will allow enough distance beyond the platform for maintenance and ac-cess from the Sand Creek Road freeway underpass.

• Access to the future platform has been designed from the soon to be built Mokelumne Bridge. As exiting capacity is a determiner of passage width, the bridge was designed assuming parking (and therefore pedestrian traffic) was equally distributed on both sides of Highway 4.

• Timing for the Ebart extension will be based on a number of is-sues including cost and estimated demand. Significant increases in housing with a population commuting creates more urgency for the station. New office space in Brentwood would generate less urgency for a EBART extension as Bart would see less rider-ship with that land-use located in Brentwood.

Tri Delta Transit Discussions with Tri Delta Transit provided insight into the layout of a Bus Transfer Station and parking for commuters. The discussion covered several preliminary plans, and how they needed to be mod-ified to work for their needs. Key Take-Aways from our conversation:• Parking should be consolidated on one side of the freeway for

convenience. Patrons will not want to drive all the way up and around Highway 4 when the smaller split lots are full.

• Walking distance from the Bus parking must be as convenient as possible to the station platform. Recommended bus stops parked on two sides of an island for a more compact design. Important to plan for a significant amount of parking, or shuttle services to satellite parking areas.

• Bus Station design at Antioch cannot be replicated due to end loaded access to EBART platform (vs. central).


Landowner Outreach Seven stakeholder groups were interviewed in the private stakeholder process. All of the groups were willing to participate and generous with their time and information. Each ownership group was presented with a presentation of preliminary concept plans, urban design concepts and project goals. There was a great degree of commonality amongst the various groups, but each also added their own particular insight as well. Comments are not direct quotes, but instead a synopsis of points made over numerous and long conversations. Organized by topic below:

Key Take-Aways on the Specific Plan Zoning: • The PA1 Specific Plan did not accurately reflect what is feasible in

Brentwood - please be sure that this proposal allows feasible develop-ment

• Housing should not be so concentrated as it is in the current PA1 Spe-cific Plan

• The proposed planning concepts in the Innovation Center Vision process should not override the Specific Plan. Land-use should be flexible if anything is to be built

• An extensive amount of process was built into the specific plan, such as housing south of Empire Avenue to support the Streets of Brent-wood - respect that process and zoning, make changes optional.

• Infrastructure that was promised in the Specific Plan must be built to enable development, specifically the Sand Creek Road and Heidorn Ranch Road extensions

• It is not clear from the City what is allowed, and their preferences have changed over the years. Clarity and feasibility is needed.

Key Take-Aways on Land-use and Density: • Office is a very difficult sell in this area. Rents are too low, banks will

not finance low return, high risk construction • Higher density attached housing is out of reach for many developers

unless they are self insured (big players only). This is why many smaller local developers prefer small detached units designed on small lots

• People don’t move to Brentwood for density. Two story, maybe three story buildings are possible, but not four.

• Brentwood needs more housing to support and attract young families. Without a substantial population of young workers it will be very diffi-cult to attract the companies that depend on them.

• The local population is not favorable to density as they have the im-pression it will attract the “wrong” people to Brentwood. We believe there are opportunities to provide higher density housing near retail amenities.

Community Outreach: Landowners Interviews

Fairbourne

Key Take-Aways on the Innovation Center Vision Goals:• Commercial development here will require public assistance. Other

past development opportunities for this area have been missed be-cause there wasn’t a public investment. The City has had the oppor-tunity to capture commercial development that would have paid for these incentives in a very short time frame. The example sited was a large resort casino that went elsewhere due to better public incentives.

• Construction of the infrastructure is key to any kind of commercial development here. The numbers do not work otherwise.

• It needs to be mixed-use. Employees will want a place to hang out after work, a bar, restaurants, entertainment. This is lacking in Brent-wood today. It is not a young person’s first choice for a place to live after college.

• The east bay needs more academic institutions. These are critical to recruit employers. There are very few Universities in the outer East Bay.

• Google will never come here. We are too far away from their work-force.

• Covid has killed the suburban office market. Its not coming back. Too many sectors have learned they no longer require large offices, and many employees would rather work from home than commute.

Key Take-Aways on Design:• Must respect property lines. It is difficult enough to get one property

owner agree to terms let alone two. • Parcel sizes should not be less than 20 acres. Lower densities require

larger parcels. Higher densities that support smaller lots are not finan-cially feasible here.

• Connections to Lone Tree Plaza must occur on Canada Valley Drive, must consider impact on businesses.

• Office is favorable over industrial uses - better able to support retail assets

• A hotel at Streets of Brentwood is a attractive concept, the location must be carefully selected to work with lease agreements with existing tenants.

• The impact of the Bart Station location needs to carefully consider how it impacts the future development of the site.

• Connecting new Streets into the Streets of Brentwood that displace ex-isting buildings and parking areas will require public financial assistance.

• Bart parking and bus transit routed through Lone Tree Plaza may be problemmatic for retail activity.


Developer Outreach Four private sector developers with experience in Next Gen office development were interviewed to gain insight on strategic thinking for the development of the Innovation Center. Below are notes from our conversations along with a quick bio:

Warren Wilson of Coventry Development Current Project: Spring Woods Village (recently secured several re-located headquarters such as Exxon and HP). Key Take-Aways: On Brentwood: • Warren stated that every project he has worked on with Rouse,

GGP and Coventry have always been “on the way to some-where”. He felt a very significant obstacle with our site is the distance from major interstates and that Highway 4 serves local traffic vs. regional

• We need a hook - clearly state the clear strategic advantage that differentiates this project from others, beyond the fact the area is unbuilt. He suggested we leverage the Agricultural Conser-vation Easement and Natural Open Spaces bordering Mt. Diab-lo - market it as a “Park Premium” - “otherwise site looks very challenging”

• Possible to consider Public Subsidy, though he does not have experience in this.

On possible development strategies with local landowners:• One possible scenario is that a prospective developer would ap-

proach a landowner with a proposal for a joint venture partner-ship. In this joint venture, the landowner must be convinced that his return will be much higher (3 times in ten years vs 1 time the current value) by engaging in this joint venture. Once the joint venture is formed, the landowner contributes land as their col-lateral and the developer takes care of costs, fees, entitlements, organizes financing for construction. Once the project begins to generate revenue priority is typically given to the landown-

Community Outreach: Private Developer Interviews

er until the cost of the land is covered. Next priority is given to covering the developer’s expenses - following this a split (some-times 50/50) of all revenue goes forward. These agreements can include options to buy etc. His example of this structure was the acquisition of the Howard Hughes Summerlin properties. Rouse promised a significant payback (this also contributed to the bank-ruptcy of GGP).

On infrastructure costs: • Both Texas and Colorado, where Coventry has projects, utilize a

Municipal Utility District. Essentially the developer is required to build the infrastructure, but then is allowed to create a tax dis-trict. Municipal Utility Districts are funded through bonds. Home-owners then pay off those bonds through MUD tax. As the debt decreases, MUD taxes may also decrease over time. Springwoods started at $1.40 and is now down to $.98 per sf (I think). He said market rate is .85. This is really common with commercial de-velopment and large home developments. They are managed by elected boards. Infrastructure will be a significant challenge for our project with the lower rents in the area.

On Springwoods: • Bit of luck - Coventry had purchased the large area of land in

the 1980’s ahead of the regions growth. Prospects on the site changed significantly with the construction of the new outer belt-way was announced. Exxon approached Coventry as they knew the value of the site access and needed 400 acres. Coventry then assessed the cost of building the required roads, storm wa-ter treatment, waste water treatment (close to 100 million at the time) and put up the capital to master plan and develop the site. First two large office tenants (Exxon and Southwestern Energy) were land purchase deals. After landing these two deals, inter-est in the site elevated and supported the prospect of Coventry pursuing vertical development. Coventry then partnered with specialty developers for the grocery, hospitality, and residential development as joint ventures. They moved from a land develop-

er to land-lord position. • Design was modeled on Reston Town Center. Parcels were

designed to merge, or split without changes to primary street network.

• Parking is “by building” for the most part. Essentially a parking garage is built only when needed by the demand generated by a new building. Parking supply is determined by time of day based on peek use (allocations to different users such as retail and office shift during the day)

• Their retail amenities are top tier and reflect the market demo-graphics, they have not seen any decline in rents for parcels not directly on the retail amenity.

• Some tenants refuse to have retail in their grade level space, but want to be within walking distance of it

• All of the tenants value the walk-ability to retail asset. • Landscape was carefully planned to provide recreational / life-

style amenities for the office workers • Not much residential product, simply because there was plenty

of office and hospitality demand. They are however watching the effects of Covid on how it may effect future office prospects

Take-aways from the call:• Brentwood location is a significant challenge • Consider leveraging the “Park Premium” power of your agricul-

tural conservation easements - make that access to produce and rural lifestyle a significant theme

• Development strategies for delivering a higher return to the landowners, but over time through a joint venture might help unlock the land opportunity

• Infrastructure financing is something we should have a clear picture for

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Developer Outreach Kris Longson of KLD - Developer Consultant Current Project: Continued redevelopment of University Place Mall in Orem Utah into a mixed-use urban center with housing, office, retail and entertainment Key Take-Aways:

On Brentwood: • The natural amenities are a great resource and an excellent com-

ponent of your narrative...however • It’s going to be a balance of economics and location. Obviously, the

location is not ideal being somewhat far from the major interstates, airports, etc. the flip side is that land costs will be lower, and the fact the land exists at all is due in part to its location. It will come down to who you are competing with.

On possible development strategies with local landowners:• Often an employer, or office developer will NOT want the landown-

er to remain in the picture. If this is the case, there are examples where City Agencies have found a way to bridge the financial gap between what the landowner wants for their property vs. what your prospective employer is willing to pay. The City can create a dis-trict where they forgo taxes (though he wasn’t totally sure this was still possible in California) to pay the landowner off incrementally over time the financial gap needed to close the deal. This allows the City to court prospects with land that is substantially cheaper than the competition. Most importantly, it is a way to get the land-owner the price they need even if the outside buyer cannot pay the landowners perceived value of the land.

• Some City Agencies use bonds to raise funds to close these gaps, and count on the increased tax revenue to fund the payments. The challenge is the bonds will typically have to be backed by General Funds.

• Whatever the incentive system is, it needs to be structured and in place to contribute to the marketability of the site. The developer needs to know what is on the table to make any possible commit-ments. Once the incentive is defined, it can and should be market-ed.


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On infrastructure costs: • Infrastructure is often part of the marketing machine. Both Cities

and Developers will market the infrastructure already available at the site to help the prospect understand how the site can lower their overall costs to development. City’s sometime pay that out of their economic development fund. Another approach is for the City to pay a developer to build the infrastructure, and then as tax reve-nues are realized at the site, pay the developer back with interest.

• Must be careful that impact fees do not climb so high that overall project costs make location unattractive. The developer will be looking at all line items.

• Understand your competition’s incentives - are nearby Cities com-peting by offering lower impact fees.

On master developers: • City will be better off trying to recruit development themselves.

Master Developers will look for massive profit (up to 40% vs. 10 to 20% cash on cash basis) for fronting the risk. Master Developers are more common on projects that are largely residential or have a large low risk component to offset the high risk component. For that to work at this site, the City would have to require substantial subsidies and likely give substantially on the riskier product (office).

On Design:• Employment centers with a unique, and strong core have a substan-

tial advantage. The better the core, the better the draw. You must design the core for the sake of the core, you can attract higher end housing closer to the core and in return, the more upscale housing product creates a more upscale address, all contributing to the draw of the core for better retail and office. For Brentwood, you can en-hance the core by how you build off the Streets of Brentwood. The office does not have to be right on the core as this site has excellent freeway frontage.

• Employees prefer retail, entertainment offerings that are part of the larger community vs. internal to the office campus. Example: Almost every apartment building offers a pool and gym and yet most of the residents will still join a gym, why? They don’t want to be limited to a small inside community. They want to be part of something bigger. Most office campus on-site f&b options come off as contrived as

they are internal - the same people day in and day out, no natural variety.

• Employers don’t want the headache of running restaurants or daycares, or gyms if possible. If they can locate within five minutes of the amenity that is close enough. This helps them control costs and let the amenities be run by folks who do it better.

• Go out of your way to make access to amenities completely ef-fortless. In some cases City’s provide and promote bike or scooter share services combined with parks and trail resources. On this site in Brentwood, what form would the best bike/ped nature path take? City’s like Park City or Jackson Hole make a big deal about this part of the lifestyle. The Mokelumne trail seems like a natural opportunity to EXPAND from. Make the best outdoor bike circuit so people can bike or walk to lunch at Streets. etc.

• Bike lanes are not that great unless you are a serious biker. You have to do better. Consider 10’ landscape between road and Bike path.

• Parking structures are a function of either City subsidies or very high land values. Plan for them, but don’t expect them anytime soon unless the City is willing to help cover their costs (and then recoup through the added activity).

Developments to Consider: • Cottonwood Corporate Center• Old Mill • Mill Rock • Silicon Slopes in Lehi, Utah (headquarters for Adobe, Micron)

Take-aways:• Design the core to be a great core, one approach is to build off the

streets of Brentwood with more premium housing product to cre-ate a more premium address for the office

• Design the amenities to easy to access and a higher bar than usual • Clearly identify the public incentives available (if any) to cover the

financial gap that will exist between what land costs and what an office developer will need it to cost. Economics are the foundation of your marketing efforts.


Developer Outreach Doug Holte - Former President Irvine Company Office Notable Project Experience: Irvine Center and Hacienda Business Park (while with Hines) Key Take-Aways:

On Brentwood: • Positive that the City has the agricultural preserve and natural

open space. It is however a pretty good distance from other office centers.

• Hub and spoke is a possibility - will need to market the vision and development numbers to San Jose, SF and Oakland tenants.

• It is also a positive that the size of the fractured parcels are still very large.

On Mechanics of Development:• Doug emphasized the importance of understanding your num-

bers very well including land costs, stipulated rents, and con-struction costs (order of magnitude) in order to be able to successfully recruit prospective business. Whomever is devel-oping the building will need to make a case for the construction financing, which will require per-signed leases and stipulated rents. All of this factors into land costs.

• The landowners are going to have to be realistic about what their land is worth. If single family homes are allowed on this site, it will be extremely difficult to close any financial gap. Single Fam-ily homes sales are strong, easy to finance (low risk). This drives the land value up on the land. The best way to manage your land cost is if your zoning does not allow single family homes. Keeping the price low on the land will be essential to seeing any construction built.

• Keep in mind that WELL CAPITALIZED tenants will help secure construction financing. Then, you must consider what product type will those tenants be after? Will that product type pencil based on the stipulated rents possible in Brentwood? Chart overall costs.


• Challenges with incubator spaces is that can be very difficult to obtain construction financing, tenants are not as well capitalized (but not always). It is heavily influenced by local considerations. Incubator spaces often go into existing construction that is cheap to rent.

On infrastructure costs: • Mello-roos, bonds, all of Doug’s experience was based on using

traditional tools that utilize bonds to build infrastructure. He sug-gested we work with KMA to determine what the Municipal Bond Financing Markets are like on Bonds for construction.

• Doug noted that his experience at Hacienda came after the infra-structure was built. He noted that most of Hacienda was devel-oped by a master developer.

• On master developers: • Incredibly unlikely. A master developer needs a degree of cer-

tainty in retail, office, and hospitality payback. All of those are impossible to predict in the advent of Covid. There is way too much risk right now for anyone to come to the table. A mas-ter developer would need legal control over the parcels, which would come at a great price with a slow payback. City is better off utilizing a master plan and using policy to shape development.

On master planning: • Must be flexible. There are products and ideas we haven’t imag-

ined yet, allow the master plan to adapt as needed to capture opportunities.

• Modify Program• Modify Infrastructure design• Flexibility to swap sites • Master plan will likely need to be massaged throughout process.

Don’t let your idea get in the way of a good one.

On Amenities: • We have moved away from the term “amenities” and replaced it

with “workday conveniences”. • One trend that was growing just before the shut down was the

growth of “On-Demand” services. Essentially workday amenities brought to the convenience of the workplace, but not necessar-ily operated by. These on demand services could include fitness, food, health services. This makes planning for a place for pick up all that more important.

• Flexible open spaces adept for a variety of activities, on-demand services, pick up, drop off, can be a valuable land planning add.

• With Lone Tree Plaza and Streets of Brentwood you have more than enough retail. In light of our current economy, it is ex-tremely unlikely you will be able to add any retail to the study area. It will also be likely that where tenants are lost in the two shopping centers you will see tenants who provide “On-De-mand” services pop up.

• Consider e-bikes, shuttles, or other services to get people to the places that can’t come to them - has to be easier than the car.

Developments to Consider: • Study the Sunnyvale Peery Park Specific Plan • Irvine Ranch Spectrum Center• Bishop Ranch Master Plan

Take-aways:• Similar to the conversation with Kris Longson, overall costs are

a crucial pillar of the development decision. Land Costs / Con-struction Costs / Stipulated Rents / Bond Strategies

• The On-Demand Workday Amenities was an interesting, it echoes some of the other ideas from Warren Wilson and Kris about how proximity to the retail is important, but perhaps not needed right next door.

• I appreciated his emphasis that having a tenant the is well cap-italized is an important factor in obtaining construction loans. This is how most retail gets built. Local tenants often come in the second round of leasing, rarely the first.


Developer Outreach Greg Weaver - Catellus - Executive Vice President Notable Project Experience: Mission Bay San Francisco, Mueller Air-port Redevelopment in Austin, Texas Key Take-Aways:

On Brentwood: • I grew up in Stockton, Highway 4 was our back door into the bay

area. I know the area well.

On Office and Covid: • Culturally people need to get together - zoom is not all bad but

its not the same On Mechanics of Development:• Austin was able to attract a master developer largely because

they owned the land. They did all of the analytics up front, with a plan, with a market analysis, they understood very well exact-ly what they wanted and what they thought was possible in the market area - WITH public financing. They were very committed to the vision and the financial assistance for the “bells and whis-tles” (infrastructure). The City put forth MULTIPLE public finance tools using a TIFF, on-site sales and property tax were recycled back into the infrastructure.

• Incentives can be tied to land-use - ex: you get the incentive IF you pursue the desired land-use. You have to align the financial interests of the landowners with the master plan.

• We do joint ventures where we bring the capital and the de-velopment expertise while the partner provides the land - very clear roles and very clear benefits. Every venture is different because every land owner is different. This is why it would serve the City well to assemble the land to avoid the headaches with multiple partners.

• Must ask what is the financial motivation - long term or short term?

• In build to suit, Tenants like Austin Energy and Texas Mutual want


YOU to take the risk. You give them a proposal for their program, a budget and then negotiate the final. They will constantly tighten the screws on the budget and transfer all the risk to the develop-er. Developer has to negotiate contingencies (which they negoti-ate down as well).

• The art of land development is to “Limit Peak Capital” - in the 80’s Land Developers were taking BIG risks, pre-building all of the infrastructure, money in the ground without tenants and rent mean the developer is accruing massive snowballing debt. Now, Land Developers only buy and build as little as they have to in or-der to keep their debt service low - but buy options for the land to maintain control.

On Recruitment: • Brokers often provide the connection - they will bring a client,

shop multiple sites, create a short list of prospects that are sim-ilar, and then that’s when it all comes down to economics and who can produce the best deal. Less common is the RFP process like Austin Energy. That is the point where overall cost is crucial.

• To attract a developer there has to be a compelling phasing plan, and that is the hardest thing to do. For instance: if a deal comes to us to build four parcels of office, the first thing we are going to do is call all the brokers in the area and get their opinion on the feasibility of that project, if it looks high risk or has a long time frame, we won’t do it, BUT if there are components of the master plan that I can make money on now, I will be more willing to take on the higher risk elements. If I have flexibility to make a hotel deal, sell some homes, or housing, make profit, that allows me time to pursue the more difficult deals such as office. All the chips don’t have to be on one market. This also can create those tax revenues to go back into the land.

• Mueller was phased - we started with residential, got lucky with Dell Children’s and our deal structure allowed us to be patient. It took 15 years, but over that time the market changed, it evolved and now, the density and uses such as office and a boutique ho-tel has happened - both considered pie in the sky.

On Amenities: • You have to consider what people want. For Texas Mutual the

CEO wanted to bike to work. He makes a very high income, and at Mueller we had housing that suited a high income level that he wanted. He also knew that his staff could live at Mueller as well in the less expensive housing that was here as well. He wanted that for his employees. That had a lot to do with our site even being considered for their headquarters.

• Find out where the decision makers want to live. Can you pro-vide that.

• Mueller is a mix of everything, from affordable housing all the way up to homes for 1.5 million.

• Access to retail, restaurants, can be used to both attract em-ployers but also reduce their needs for internal daycare or cafe-terias - which they don’t really want to do anyway.

• You have to be careful that your development is set up to sup-port mixed-use to begin with, most traditional office parks are not.

Developments to Consider: • South Lake Union in Seattle • Ford Motor Building in skid row, Los Angeles• ASU Mixed-use Master Plan

Take-aways:• The City will have a better selection of developers interested in

Brentwood if they can set conditions that allow those developers enough low risk product to offset the high risk product.

• Tie scale of incentive to type of land-use - if the developer can deliver something that meets the City’s vision to a higher degree it unlocks better incentive opportunities.

• Active retail, public spaces, sense of place are part of a holistic approach to land use. Often, of these non-office elements are present at a very high level, you will have an greater ability to attract office development.

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Conclusions: The outreach, research process has provided insight that we will work to incorporate into our plan refinements, incentive strategies and marketing package. This ultimately brings us back to our key diagram. The master plan will be instrumental in charting a path forward that can align all of the various considerations, reducing risk, providing returns in order to attract workforce development to Brentwood. We know that this is an especially competitive field, and if we are only marginally better than our competition, it will not be enough.

Below are a few highlights that have already and will continue to in-fluence the plan:

• Develop a phasing plan that reduces financial risk and shows profit

• Take a holistic approach to lifestyle and on-site amenities - is it possible for our plan to “have it all” at least more than the competition

• Identify and market your incentives - scale your incentives to the level at which the project achieves the desired vision

• Define your hook - How can your master plan design and site location tell a compelling story how Brentwood is a better choice.

• Spend wisely on infrastructure - avoid big ticket items unless you can identify a funding source

• It is important for The Innovation Center to be inviting to the people of Brentwood and reflect and elevate the Brentwood brand and lifestyle

• How can the plan enhance Brentwood’s appeal to the younger workforce

These and many other considerations will continue to influence and refine our plan thinking moving into the final phases of our visioning process, incentive definitions, and marketing strategies.

Conclusions

Community

Considerations

Landowner

Considerations

Employer

Considerations

Developer

Considerations

MASTER PLAN OPTIONS

MASTER PLAN OPTIONS

The Innovation Center @ Brentwood

Documents

Transcript of The Innovation Center @ Brentwood