These comments are off topic. Can I create another prompt for this topic?

http://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=21372

Also – I don’t think any building on the mall is as authentic to place as the mall itself. In terms of design. Though the other historic buildings are beautiful, you can find similar ones in other cities across the state.

The other APN issue seems like a relatively minor technicality compared to the prospect of the malls destruction.

Though you may think eligibility is sufficient now, I have a hunch you’ll see why it wasn’t enough in the future. Did you read the editorial the Fresno Bee ran about the Mall? The framing of the arguments was so manipulative that I consider it bias, either consciously or unconsciously. The Mall’s chances are not too good here.

I think the mall also needs to be listed as a district due to the fee simple ownership issue. I don’t understand how a single resource can be listed with 43 different APN numbers, but the state is going to have to resolve that mess. Linear resources made up of multiple properties with multiple owners, such as canals, are traditionally treated as districts. I am satisfied for now that the finding of criteria eligibility and the treatment of the mall as a historic resource for CEQA will be sufficient, until Historic Resources Group finished their survey, and the entire document comes before the HPC for approval.

Ultimately the State HRC will make its decision. Also, I am told that even if the State HRC rejects the application due to owner opposition, it may still forward the application to the Keeper of the Register in Washington DC and could still deem it eligible. In some ways eligibility is more important than listing.

I think eligibility means the CEQA process will be long and drawn out, and probably trigger public hearings to decide the issue- which unfortunately in Fresno’s case is a bad thing because the general public don’t know anything about the Fulton Mall and won’t come to defend it.

The Kearney Mansion analogy is not accurate here.(neither is the ground floor-upper floor) The mall was built at a different time and is aesthetically distinct from the surrounding buildings. Also, an error in your district idea is that some buildings on the mall may not be significant historic resources.

I can see how some felt it was speaking out of turn, this is a valid feeling, but I think the stakes here were worth speaking out of turn.

The real context you should have been considering:

Fresno has a history for not valuing it’s resources, I don’t think I need to provide you with any examples here, you probably know well enough. Most of our civic leaders are business people who will side with other business people, in this case the property owners, even if their reasoning on issues is illogical.(People seem to think that the mall failed because it is closed to traffic, when there is no evidence of this whatsoever – and there exists astoundingly more convincing other explanations) I don’t need to go into the design merits of the mall, but I will say that it does EVERYTHING good design is suppose to and there are no other historic structures that are as authentically “Fresno.” In your newspaper quote you said the mall has value – deciding what has value to the community and protecting it is your job on that committee. By protecting valuable assets communities express their values and it is leaders who decide to do the protecting and ultimately shape a community.

Ultimately this is a value issue and hopefully Fresno has some leaders around to make a difference on this one.

My goal here was to convince you that you and the other commissioners made a mistake and I hope that I was successful. If I was a little harsh I apologize, I very much appreciate your response. If I were you I would publicly rescind my vote, even if it’s too late to officially make a difference, a symbolic gesture can be powerful.

Also, please know that the mall is already being afforded the same protection it would received if it were on the National Register under CEQA. The ongoing Fulton Corridor Specific Plan is treating the mall as a historic resource for the purposes of CEQA and will create an EIR that studies potential impacts to the historic resource, potential project alternatives and potential mitigation measures.

Also remember in some cases, the issue of eligibility is more important that actual designation, at least in California with the way CEQA works. This may be one of those.

As far as not listing the mall at this time, several arguments were presented. There were the property owners on the mall, who thus far are largely opposed to the NRHP listing. Another concern was that now was not the time to do this, as the entire area is in the midst of the Specific Planning process, which includes a historic resource survey. This is a community led process and some were concerned that listing the mall now would be in effect speaking out of turn. I was not totally convinced that would be the case however.

My biggest issue was the one of context. You can’t adequately address a linear resource like the Fulton Mall in isolation, which is what this particular application does. You need to also look at the larger historic context of the place and specifically the historic buildings that the mall was built to serve. The Fulton Mall is 3 dimensional, not 2 dimensional. Listing the mall, but not the buildings would be like listing Kearney Park, but not Kearney Mansion, or the ground floor of a building, but not the upper floors. The buildings on Fulton Mall are an integral part of the place. I believe that a future National Register DISTRICT exists on the mall and hope that the historic resource survey does the work necessary to bring that forward. Such a district would include the mall.