Playa Vista: Wetlands Development is a Financial Quagmire... for the developer

July 13, 2006

The head of Playa Vista, Steve Soborrof says his project has lost $600 million for its investors...see the last paragraph

"Panel moderator David Abel put the key question: Can Playa Vista serve as a model for other developments? Can it be replicated? Soboroff said that the project had produced $600 million in losses to three companies and taken 20 years, all because people thought of it as a real estate project instead of a public policy project. “Take 15 years off of that, and yes, it can,” he said. “Real estate people are funny,” he added – they think neighbors are a nuisance, environmentalists are crazy, politicians are on the take, the press is biased, and so I’ll just duke it out. “They’ve got it upside down,” he concluded. "