Pasadena Weighs a Decades-Long Hahamongna Deal With Its Lone Bidder

Pasadena is preparing to entrust a vacant, publicly owned compound in the Hahamongna Watershed Park to the only organization that bid to run it, potentially for as long as four decades, even though the nonprofit’s plan depends on money it has not yet raised.

On Monday, June 22, the Pasadena City Council will consider authorizing the city manager to enter into a pre-development agreement, and to negotiate final development and operating agreements, with Outward Bound Adventures for the development and operation of public land in the park.

The path here was narrow. The process began September 8, when the Council unanimously approved staff recommendations on allowable uses for the Annex Area buildings, added a requirement that proposers fund a feasibility study, and directed staff to issue a request for proposals. That request, published December 18, reached 1,488 potential vendors; 44 downloaded it, and one responded. Outward Bound Adventures submitted the lone proposal on February 27, and a selection committee of staff from the Parks, Recreation and Community Services, Public Works and Finance departments scored it 81. The city ran a competitive selection process under the Pasadena Municipal Code; competitive bidding is not required under the city charter for “professional or unique services.”

Outward Bound Adventures is a Pasadena-based 501(c)(3) nonprofit founded in 1962 and, in the words of the staff report, “recognized as the oldest environmental justice organization in the U.S.” focused on nature-based education for underserved youth and families. It would lead a proposed Climate Resilience Environmental Education Center, transforming the former U.S. Forest Service compound at the park’s Annex Area — six vacant buildings the city had also considered demolishing — into a hub for environmental education, ecological restoration, workforce development and public programming. The report describes a “community first” model, with pending partnerships with local and tribal organizations and alignment with the city’s Climate Action Plan.

The proposal depends on grant funding, philanthropic support and outside fundraising that, the report states, “have not yet been secured.” Accordingly, staff recommends that any agreement carry milestone-based requirements tied to demonstrated funding commitments, environmental clearance, feasibility review and city approval of future phases.

Under terms the city may negotiate, the agreement could require the nonprofit to complete a feasibility study — including structural and seismic evaluations, a Phase I environmental site assessment and hazardous materials testing — along with a detailed site restoration plan, and to adopt “adaptive reuse” and “low embodied carbon” design as binding objectives. An operating agreement could set public hours of 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., manage peak-season visitation of up to roughly 300 visitors a day and require quarterly reporting.

Contingent on the feasibility study, staff recommends an initial 20-year term with two additional ten-year renewals. As a condition of a 2019 Los Angeles County Regional Park and Open Space District grant for habitat restoration, the district must review and approve any successful proposer operating at the park’s Oak Grove Area Improvement Project site — a process staff says has already begun. Staff classifies the authorization itself as not a “project” under the California Environmental Quality Act, so it requires no environmental document, though any future development would face separate review.

No direct capital funding is proposed, and under the request for proposals the proposer would bear all costs of planning, environmental review, permitting, development, operations and maintenance. No General Fund appropriation is requested at this time.