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Michael Banner Named New Chair of ULI Los AngelesJune 30, 2005ULI Los Angeles, a district council of the Urban Land Institute, has named Michael Banner as its new Chair. Banner will assume leadership of the influential land-use and real estate organization effective July 1, 2005, serving a two-year term.Banner, who recently chaired ULI Los Angeles’ Inner City Committee, is president and chief executive officer of Los Angeles LDC, Inc. Los Angeles LDC (Local Development Company - a non profit community development finance company) provides needed debt or investment capital to develop emerging or growth businesses and catalytic real estate development projects located in distressed neighborhoods. “I believe Michael's demonstrated leadership in urban revitalization and economic development, his understanding of our District Council’s key initiatives, his success as chair of Urban Marketplace, and his numerous activities with the Institute all contribute to make him an ideal chair of ULI Los Angeles,” said John Menne, immediate past ULI LA Chair. “Our District Council is very well positioned to build upon its role as a leader of the Los Angeles real estate community.” Banner also is a trustee and Inner City Advisor of the Urban Land Institute. But perhaps Banner’s most notable role with ULI Los Angeles, up until now, has been as chair of Urban Marketplace, the interactive conference devoted to neighborhood revitalization. The most recent conference was March 16 at the Los Angeles Convention Center. The event is considered a measure of the interest in urban development in Los Angeles. When it launched five years ago, attendees numbered approximately 200. At the March 2005 event there were nearly 900 registrants… including developers (large and small), financiers, representatives of cities, homebuilders and urban consultants of all types. A native of Los Angeles, Banner grew up in Watts and is a graduate of Loyola Marymount University. As president and CEO of Los Angeles LDC, Banner oversees the leading socially responsible community development financial institution in Los Angeles County. And he hopes to bring this approach to ULI Los Angeles. “Because of our vast brain trust and research capabilities, ULI offers a high level of credibility,” said Banner. “We are able to cross many different disciplines in land use: financing, development, urban planning, architecture. And if there is an issue that needs attention, we have the intellectual capital to address it.” In the past, this brain trust has been able to help some of Los Angeles most underserved neighborhoods, focusing, for example, on opportunities for new retail in inner-city corridors. “Since the civil disturbances of the early 1990s, ULI has been able to help energize organizations that seek a wider range of goods and services for their communities,” he said. “And we’ve helped create a better understanding of real estate in those communities. Real estate development can also be economic development. And ULI is devoted to development that improves the total urban environment.” In particular, Banner will focus the organization on its UrbanPlan program, which works with public schools in the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD). In this award-winning program, students create hypothetical urban renewal plans with a three-dimensional model. The semester concludes with a scholarship competition sponsored by ULI Los Angeles where the criteria include oral presentations. In the process, students work with actual real estate, architecture, financing and other professionals who are members of ULI Los Angeles. “I’d like to expand the partnership between ULI and LAUSD,” said Banner. “City living is a reality for kids today. And to get good schools, safe places to live and play, and economically vibrant communities, you need school children who are grounded in strong notions of community. The UrbanPlan program allows kids to experience what their community means to them in this very fundamental way.” Besides education and community development, ULI can bring its expertise to bear on the many other issues related to real estate that affect the essential quality-of-life of Angelenos, said Banner. These include affordability of homes, the availability of open spaces in urban communities, and the impacts of traffic congestion on families and neighborhoods. “Los Angeles offers important lessons in land use: We experience many approaches that work well and others that don’t. There are deep complexities to issues such as housing and traffic. But because of the vast size of the city, and the diversity of its neighborhoods, we’re not limited to a cookie-cutter approach. If there is an issue that needs attention, we can focus very credible intellectual energies on it. And we can do it in an unbiased fashion. That’s another way ULI can offer a framework to present the best solutions.” Banner also believes that the some of the solutions for L.A.’s problems can be applied to other cities as well: “L.A. is a vast urban laboratory, with lots of urban DNA.” And Banner hopes to expand the dialog about real estate in Los Angeles by expanding the diversity of ULI membership in the city. “I’d like to try to ensure that ULI LA is a forum for everyone in the real estate industry. The more diverse our membership, the easier it will be to have positive, creative dialog about land use,” he said. “The richness of the conversation will be that much more valuable when everybody is participating.” Jack Skelley is public relations director for Roddan Paolucci Roddan Advertising and Public Relations and serves on the Executive Committee of ULI Los Angeles as chair of the Communications Committee. | |
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