Costa Mesa, California

Triangle Square mall in downtown Costa Mesa was built more than a decade ago with a loan from the City and the use of eminent domain to clear out several existing businesses.  It was expected to pull in $1 million in sales tax revenues annually, but in 2004, the City collected only $200,000.[1]  Since then, the situation has only become worse.  The retail center now sits largely vacant, and many of the anchor tenants, including Niketown, have left.[2]  Former Mayor Sandra Genis, the sole dissenter when the City approved the $62 million project in 1989, said, “If the market was there, it would have happened on its own.”[3]  The mall’s major tenants have gradually left, including a Virgin Megastore in September 2005 and a Barnes and Noble bookshop in January 2006.[4]  In December 2005, City officials blamed “poor marketing” on the mall’s failures, ignoring entirely the thriving businesses they condemned for the mall’s owner under the promise of “redevelopment.”[5]