$1-Bil Project Gets City's Blessing

LOS ANGELES-The City Council here has approved a $1-billion plan by moguls Philip Anschutz and Rupert Murdoch to convert 27 acres of privately owned land around Downtown’s Staples Center into a bustling shopping and entertainment district.

Elated officials at LA Arena Land Co., the Anschutz-Murdoch development entity, said after the vote that they hope to break ground on the project next year. Anschutz is the Denver billionaire who helped to build Staples Center in the late 1990s. Murdoch’s Fox Entertainment Group owns several TV networks and newspapers around the world and also owns the LA Dodgers.

Though the council voted 11-0 in favor of the project, the development team didn’t get everything it wanted—at least, not yet. The council decided to delay voting on whether to provide LA Arena Land with a multimillion-dollar subsidy to build a 1,200-room hotel inside the zone, on the southern rim of Downtown.