School District OKs $76.5-Mil Ambassador Purchase

LOS ANGELES-The LA Unified School District has agreed to pay $76.5 million for the Wilshire District’s Ambassador Hotel, where movie stars danced away the nights for more than half a century and Robert F. Kennedy’s life was later cut short by an assassin’s bullet.

The district plans to use the site, along Wilshire Boulevard near Vermont Avenue, to build a sorely needed high school and perhaps a middle school for the area. Though the vote is a key step toward buying the parcel, it will likely take school officials several months or even years to formulate a development plan that is acceptable to local homeowner groups, businesses and preservationists.

Some homeowners in the area want to see the 23-acre site include new retail and office space while others are adamantly opposed to anything but construction of educational facilities. Business leaders have called for a mix of uses, while some preservationists have floated plans that would restore the now-empty hotel to its original splendor.