This being the first Real Estate column with my byline for the San Fernando Valley Business Journal, let me offer some disclaimers and details to help you, the reader. By way of introduction, I’m Valley born and raised and the son of a native as well. I went to both public and private schools, drove a school bus and rode to school on one; I have worked in retail and for local companies, national and international corporations and for myself. But during most of the last 25 years I’ve been putting out publications of one sort or another and had a couple columns of my own. A column is distinct from a typical staff report in that with the high-profile byline, it permits greater latitude for personal interpretation and places a clear responsibility upon the writer for that interpretation. For example, a vague shift in the zeitgeist can be alluded to under my byline without crediting a think tank or economic report, because it’s my view of the world around me. And if I get that wrong, I lose the ability to blame that think tank. Some writers use columns to express their opinions and nothing but I’ll promise not to do that and some use columns to make obscure references and to release their inner Walt Whitman to hammer their words on the anvil of metaphor I cannot promise not to do that. But I can promise not to be so first person. Not this time, however, because in addition to everything already mentioned, among the responsibilities of a columnist is to declare their conflicts, where personal life overlaps with the topics of the text. Which brings us to the Reseda Theater. <!– Now: Reseda Theater after 20 years of neglect. –> Now: Reseda Theater after 20 years of neglect. As a Reseda homeowner, I was on the inaugural board of the Reseda Neighborhood Council and involved in the group’s formation and certification. Constant in those early discussions was how the revitalization of the community was dependent upon that theater. It’s been closed for about 20 years now, but 30 years ago it was a place to go to see rock ‘n’ roll movies and I saw a few, most notably Frank Zappa’s “200 Motels.” When the Community Redevelopment Agency bought the place, the Daily News interviewed me (without mentioning that I used to work there) and put me in their story undoubtedly because I had a good answer to why the Reseda Theater was so germane to the image of the neighborhood. “Because to everyone who drives by, it’s a big sign that Reseda is a piece of shit,” I said. The reporter was kind enough to let me fine-tune that quote to something less profane. The Business Journal, however, has a decidedly more universally adult readership. Since then CIM Group, they of the Hollywood and Highland, Brea downtown and Huntington Beach Strand developments among dozens of others has an operating agreement with the CRA/LA. The plan is for a multi-use facility capable of everything from private events and banquets, to movies, lectures and stage shows like music concerts, a dance club, live theater and comedy shows. Plus the plan includes tearing down a building behind it on Canby Street for a parking lot. Specifics of that plan include space for three dance floors, a full bar, variances for parking and signs including keeping the theater-style marquee, Although details aren’t being discussed until the written determination is mailed expected this week Nic Brown of the City Planning Commission said just about everything in the request has been approved, with the exception of some parking issues that are merely procedural. Newly elected chair of the Reseda Neighborhood Council Peter Hankwitz is looking forward to the project getting under way. “I have nothing but optimism about it,” he said. Like many in the neighborhood anticipating something after 20 years of blight, he said he’d “support almost any growth” with the exception if it being “just a large bar.” Shaul Kuba, principal and founder of CIM Group, said “it has taken us a long time to process the conditional use permit. Now we can move into Building and Safety.” Getting those permits, Kuba said, should take three to four months. Work could begin by late spring, he said and following that, “We guess it will be 14 to 16 months until we are fully done.” Furthermore, the revamped Reseda Theater is but a single step that the developer has taken to begin revitalizing the neighborhood. Three blocks to the west, across from the grocery store, planning is under way for a multi-use development of housing and retail that will be pivotal to bringing the neighborhood to its potential. “Add several hundred residents who live in that village and you have all those eyes watching 24/7,” Kuba said, which will reassure and encourage other developers. Garth Carlson, who was also among those in the formation of the Reseda Neighborhood Council and is still on the board, was also in that Daily News story where he lamented Reseda’s image. That remains a concern, but now there’s a prospect for change. “This will be a large upgrade to Reseda,” he said. “This can be a drawing card to bring people into Reseda instead of people going elsewhere,” and that will draw more development, Carlson said. NBC’s Burbank Land Sold, Agreement Continues The Burbank City Council has approved the transfer of a development agreement to Catalina Media Development II LLC, created by developer M. David Paul and Associates and Stockbridge Real Estate Fund. The development agreement is inherited from the sale of the 34-acre NBC Universal studio property to Paul, late last month The agreement allows for 1.8 million-square-feet of media-specific office space on Alameda and Olive avenues, with another 670,000 square feet still available. Paul has developed other properties in Burbank, including the 9-acre property purchased in ’05 from NBC, an office tower christened The Point, and The Pinnacle Building in the Media District. NBC Universal is planning to move to a major development on and adjacent to its Universal Studios property.