In an effort to keep one of downtown Los Angeles' biggest residential hotels as affordable housing amid the explosion of high-end condo development, the city is considering issuing $55 million in tax-exempt bonds to developers who want to renovate the Alexandria Hotel.
The nearly-500 unit Alexandria, built in 1906, was once one of the city's grandest hotels. An ornate, 60-foot-high lobby of Italian and Egyptian marble and extravagant gold leaf ceilings welcomed guests, who included members of the Hollywood elite and three U.S. presidents, Theodore Roosevelt, William Taft and Woodrow Wilson.
For The Record
Los Angeles Times Wednesday October 26, 2005 Home Edition Main News Part A Page 2 National Desk 1 inches; 37 words Type of Material: Correction
Alexandria Hotel -- A map with an article in Friday's California section about the Alexandria Hotel in Los Angeles showed the hotel on the northwest corner of 5th and Spring streets. It is on the southwest corner.
But that glory faded long ago. For the last few decades, the building, at 5th and Spring streets, has been home to a mix of the elderly, disabled and working poor, who pay several hundred dollars a month for rooms without kitchens.
As downtown's renaissance swirls all around, the Alexandria's own dazzling architecture and location have made it a prime target for conversion. The family that owns the hotel has long been rumored to be in talks to sell the building.
The new effort to keep the Alexandria as affordable housing comes a week after the City Council voted to draw up a temporary moratorium on conversions of single-room occupancy hotels to lofts and condos amid concerns that the poor who have called downtown home for decades are being pushed out.
On Thursday, the Community Redevelopment Agency gave initial approval to a San Diego-based developer's plans to finance the acquisition, construction and rehabilitation of the hotel.
The developer, Amerland Group, specializes in affordable and senior housing, and under the terms of the deal, would keep the units as affordable housing for 55 years.
Backers described the plan as a milestone for downtown, where a historic building would be renovated but still reserved for units with below-market rents. Until now, developers have said the cost of restoring old bank buildings and other historic structures was so high that the only way they could make their money back was to immediately sell the units as condos or charge hefty rents.
"Every other project downtown that has involved an older building generally has involved conversion to luxury lofts," said Amerland partner Jules Arthur. His group, he said, plans to do "what we think is the right thing and create some affordable housing in a market that we think has some definite demand for it."
