LOS ANGELES—Hollywood is certainly undergoing a renaissance,complete with major office development and massive residentialdevelopment and redevelopment that will change the marketdramatically over the next decade. However, some developers arebeing deterred from the market because of unclear zoning and alengthy entitlement process that is both time consuming andcostly.

In an earlier story, GlobeSt.com reported thatChampion Real Estate sold 1.75 acres of land for$39.9 million, a record price. The land was originally slated infor development, but the firm changed their business plan aftergoing through the entitlement process. "After we got our approvals,a court determined that Hollywood's community plan update, uponwhich the city required that we designed our project, was thrownout, and as a result, all projects had to go back to the priorcommunity plan, which required us to go back and modify ourentitlements," Bob Champion, president of ChampionReal Estate, tells GlobeSt.com. "This whole thing took about a yearand a half longer than expected, so when we did receiveentitlements, we realized that with all of the resources that wehad spent on this property our business had changed. We decidedthat rather than using the capital to build this project, we wouldtake our profits and use that to further bolster our value-addbusiness."

Champion says that the biggest issue for developers is publicpolicy and a lack of clarity. He notes that Hollywood is one of thesubmarkets where the city is trying to build greater density, buthe says that poor planning is deterring developers, like him, frominvesting in the market. "You first have to look at public policy.The city of Los Angeles made a huge commitment to Hollywood in theform of transportation and in the amount of projects that weresponsored by the redevelopment agency. One of the city's policieswas that there were certain areas where the city was going toencourage higher density, and Hollywood was one," he says. "Weworked very closely with Mayor Garcetti's office when he was thecouncilman for this district and later with councilman O'Farrell.It was something that we were really excited about but frustratedby the court challenges and the flipping back and forth."