Redevelopers make their case to cityFriday, October 29, 2010
Last updated: Friday October 29, 2010, 6:10 PM
BY MARK J. BONAMO
Hackensack Chronicle
Managing Editor
HACKENSACK — Ken Narva came to Hackensack as a man with a plan.
The managing partner of Street-Works LLC, a New York-based real estate development and consulting firm hired two years ago by Hackensack's Main Street Business Alliance, Narva offered a vision of a revitalized downtown where old memories of a vibrant Main Street will be new again.
"You have a downtown that has a history of being successful," said Narva, standing before City Manager Stephen Lo Iacono, the entire City Council and a crowd of about 60 local residents and businessmen at a special Oct. 21 council meeting where the alliance presented its proposal for a renewed city center. "If cities don't keep moving& they stall. And there have to be leaders to do it."
Narva's call to redevelopment arms comes at a time when the leaders of the city's special improvement district have called for changes in zoning regulations along Main Street to help reshape downtown and with it Hackensack's future.
Overlay district desired
The Main Street Business Alliance unveiled its redevelopment plans after holding information sessions for city residents and business owners in recent months. A critical component of its strategy is to make the stretch of Main Street from the Bergen County Courthouse to the Sears building an "overlay district." Such a district designation would allow Main Street, a one-way thoroughfare that travels just over a mile and is currently zoned for business use, to utilize new site and building design regulations. These new rules would permit new taller, mixed-use buildings that would include residential units, additional parking, a supermarket and outdoor eateries.
The alliance's proposal also includes the formation of three mixed-use neighborhoods along Main Street. A northern section, located south of the Sears building, would be primarily residential. A central section would have a civic focus, centered on City Hall and the Johnson Public Library. The southern section, near the courthouse, would revolve around office space and includes plans for Hackensack University Medical Center (HUMC) to shift some of its medical office space to the Main Street area.
Jerome Lombardo, chairman of the non-profit alliance, spoke at the council meeting in favor of adopting the overlay-zoning plan.
"If you like what you hear tonight, we ask you to embrace the plan, designate the boundaries, and then set the table, by creating new forward-thinking, practical zoning within the district, so as the economy recovers, the natural forces of the free market will help rebuild our downtown," said Lombardo, a real estate manager.
"We want to create a new downtown, a place where people will come to, not through," he added.
Consultant offers constructive critiques
During the presentation, Narva pointed out downtown Hackensack's strengths, including the city's position as the hub of Bergen County, itself a key tile in the mosaic of metropolitan New York. He cited as well the importance of having the county courthouse and HUMC within the city's boundaries, the proximity of major highways, and the remembered role of Main Street as the main artery of a pulsing business district.
However, Narva, whose company was paid more than $100,000 by the alliance in the past two years, according to Lombardo, also expressed strong opinions about what needed to be changed to bring Main Street back to its earlier 20th century glory, when the road was a county-wide retail and entertainment Mecca.
"Is one-way traffic on Main Street a success? No. It dooms it to failure," he said. "Main streets have to have great public places to arrive to, and have to have places to park. Great cities are designed from the street up."
Narva, noting his company has worked on similar redevelopment projects in cities such as Bethesda, Md. and West Hartford, Conn., then bluntly backed the proposed zoning changes.
"Your zoning does not work downtown," he said. "It's archaic, it's anti-development, it's anti-urban. It needs to change. That doesn't mean you change the zoning of the whole city. It means you have to change the zoning of this area."
Narva also addressed the fears of some property owners that the establishment of an "overlay district" would lead to their properties being taken through eminent domain.
"Nobody is going to take your property, nobody is kicking you out," Narva said. "This is free-market purchase and partnership. You don't want to sell your property? You don't want to be a tenant? You don't have to be. Downtowns are organic in how they grow."
Alliance officials added that the expense for the proposed project, which would cost millions, would be paid by developers, with new zoning regulations potentially encouraging developers to also help with public improvements.
In an interview after his council meeting presentation, Narva re-emphasized the importance of creating a new "overlay district" in downtown Hackensack by warning how this promising new future for the area could be derailed.
"The surefire way for this not to work is not to understand how complex it is, and that it takes a very experienced group to help insure that it stays on track all the way through," Narva said.
Residents, government look to downtown's future
After listening to the Main Street redevelopment plan presentation, council members made uniformly positive remarks, expressing hope for a more dynamic downtown.
"There's a very real possibility of moving the city of Hackensack forward," said Mayor Karen Sasso. "It's up to us to figure out what the specifics need to be."
Sasso also announced after the presentation that the City Council has hired planner Francis Reiner of DMR Architects and attorney Douglas Doyle of the DeCotiis Fitzpatrick & Cole law firm to review the redevelopment initiative, with Doyle to be paid $125 per hour.
While expressing uncertainty about how long, and exactly how, any redevelopment plans could be realized, Lo Iacono referred to Hackensack's past when looking to downtown's possible future.
"I want to see the kind of vibrant Main Street that we had when I was young and came here with my parents," said Lo Iacono, who sits on the alliance's board.
Albert Dib, the executive director of the Main Street Business Alliance and a lifelong resident of Hackensack, also hoped for a harmonious hybrid vision for a redeveloped Main Street.
"I want to see a respect for the past, and I want to see people," said Dib, who is also the city's historian. "It's really more about people than about structures, and about making a warm, inviting, community atmosphere."
Local business owner Lakhi Sangtani looked forward to more foot traffic flowing through his Main Street establishment.
"We have to give people a reason to come to Main Street," said Sangtani, who has owned Java's Brewin for five years. "If they can bring in more residents, more apartments and different services, they will have a reason."
Longtime Main Street business owner Jerry Some knows that the redevelopment plan is a first step in a long-term process, but he would rather hurry up than wait.
"It took us two years to get to this point," said Some, 83, who owns Some's Uniforms. "It could take us five or six years to get this done. My problem is that I want to be around to see it. It's started now, and I have something to look forward to. Change is a part of progress. You can't stop it."
City resident Sal Puleio expressed high hopes that his hometown on the Hackensack River might soon mirror the fate of a New Jersey town on the Hudson River.
"One of the reasons that I moved to Hackensack 27 years ago is that I like the urban environment," said Puleio, who owns an auto service shop several blocks from Main Street. "Back then, Hoboken was becoming alive again and being gentrified. Hackensack could just as easily be one of these places. I've been looking forward to this."
City residents have been looking forward for decades to a less-moribund Main Street, one with fewer shuttered storefronts.
Although Narva noted that any redevelopment process is "a marathon, not a sprint," he emphasized that now is the time for civic leaders to put on their running shoes.
"This city has every opportunity and chance to be successful," Narva said. "Right now, people go 'Hackensack?' with a question mark. That question mark has to become a period. It has to become an exclamation point."
E-mail: bonamo@northjersey.com