The Inglewood City Council has approved a plan that will displace 41 businesses and 305 workers to make room for a 1.6-mile automated people mover connecting the Metro K line to the city’s burgeoning sports and entertainment district.
The city’s relocation plan, passed unanimously by the council on Tuesday, April 11, estimates it will cost roughly $12 million to move the businesses from their current locations. That total doesn’t include any of the cost to acquire the properties, the plan notes.
“We’re really trying to do everything we can to help people stay within the city and thrive through the process,” Lisa Trifileti, the consultant hired to guide the project, told council members.
The city has assigned “relocation specialists” to each business to assist with the application process and with finding a new home, though the plan states there is no guarantee “that the business owner will find a replacement site that it finds to be acceptable.”
Before voting on the plan, Councilman Eloy Morales pledged the city will “go above and beyond’ to help those affected.
“Whatever the law allows us to do, we’re going to take it as far as we can to help the businesses succeed,” he said.
The relocations are expected to “happen over an 18-to-24-month period” and only businesses occupying the space at the time that the city makes an offer for the property — which could begin later this year — will be eligible for the relocation funds, the approved plan states.
Most of the businesses affected are either at the Inglewood Center shopping plaza at Market Street and Florence Avenue, or at the Holly Park Plaza at Prairie Avenue and Hardy Street. Both locations are slated to be replaced with stations for the Inglewood Transit Connector, the automated rail system that will ferry visitors to The Kia Forum, SoFi Stadium and the Los Angeles Clippers’ future home, the Intuit Dome.
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