Editorial: Stop the secret shopping center wars

0 Comments | Oakland Tribune, Feb 5, 2009 | by Anonymous

IF SHOPPING CENTER developers can't behave, we'd appreciate it if they would take their street fight elsewhere.

We learned this week that the Taubman Group has been behind the stealth referendum campaign to block a rival developer's plans for a Neiman Marcus store in the Broadway Plaza shopping mall in downtown Walnut Creek.

Taking advantage of community concern about the proposed size and parking for the store, Taubman spent nearly $95,000 on politicking and a referendum drive that forced Broadway Plaza owner Macerich Co. to withdraw its original plans and scale back the project.

The outcome might have been for the better. Residents had legitimate concerns about the Macerich proposal. But that was a fight for residents to have with the city, not for Taubman to secretly bankroll. Moreover, if Taubman insisted on participating in the political fight, it should have done so publicly. Residents and the City Council had a legitimate right to know who was behind the political campaign.

Unfortunately, state campaign finance laws allowed Taubman to keep its identity secret until this week's deadline for reporting last year's political expenditures. While the decisions about the Neiman Marcus project were being made, city residents had no way to learn the identity of the deep-pockets funding the referendum drive.

In a statement, Taubman says it launched its stealth campaign as a matter of "fundamental fairness," and that it did so secretly because "we did not want the legitimate grievances of the local citizens to be circumvented by placing the focus on our involvement." Yeah right. Fundamental fairness would dictate that all the players are transparent about their financial roles and motives.

Now the city must consider the scaled-back proposal Macerich has submitted. We suspect there will be more political fighting. At least now folks will know where the money is coming from.

Meanwhile, down in San Ramon where plans are being developed for a rival shopping center, another secret campaign has been launched, this time questioning that City Council's extension of a contract with the developer there, Sunset Development.

Sunset CEO Alex Mehran denies any involvement in the political shenanigans. Taubman is one of several shopping center operators that has been talking to Mehran about his project. We suspect that we're witnessing Macerich payback for Taubman's activities in Walnut Creek.

It's all very childish and unseemly. We welcome a spirited and thoughtful debate of shopping center development plans in the region. But if the participants can't act like grown-ups -- if they can't publicly stand behind their actions -- we wish they would stay home.