The Paseo District – then and now
By: Bert Belanger//Guest Columnist//January 3, 2019
New Year’s causes us to look both back and to the future, and no starker contrast comes from Oklahoma City’s Paseo District. Decades before I met David Chapman at the University of Central Oklahoma, I started my journey in commercial real estate in this decayed area. Over the decades since, we redeveloped The Breighton Apartments. I have marveled at the ever-expanding list of names of those whose efforts combined to create what is now a nationally recognized urban neighborhood.
When my California-based partners Carlyle MacHarg, Ted Foley and I bought our first burned-out fourplex in 1990 (from a retired truck driver) near N. Shartel Avenue and NW 29th Street, the first person I called was John Lampton Belt. John was a prolific preservationist of buildings in Spanish Village, developed by G.A. Nichols in the 1920s, as a unique collection of housing and retail. By 1990, this once vibrant area was at its lowest point; the latest oil bust and equity skimmers had decimated values, leaving it a scary place.
However, from 1989 through 1996, the year we reopened the 12 tile-roofed buildings as a $5 million complex of 96 affordable apartments, I worked with a “village” of diverse thought leaders instrumental in the first steps in the renaissance of downtown OKC. Mayor Ron Norick, Councilman Mark Schwartz, and city staffers JoeVan Bullard (assistant city manager), Jim Couch (Public Works) and Garner Stoll (head planner) each shared a vision with citizen leaders, including John Kilpatrick, Renate Wiggin, John Yoeckel, Mike Mize and Cliff Hudson (all living in nearby Heritage Hills) – to reconnect and revitalize the neighborhoods “Near North” of downtown, most of which had originally been developed by Nichols.
By 1990, the Paseo had its own cheerleaders in the press, led by The Journal Record’s own Max Nichols, as well as cub reporters Jack Money and Steve Lackmeyer. One morning in January 1994, I met Max in one of our buildings under reconstruction; as I showed him with pride the new wiring and sheetrock, shots rang out from outside. We exited to see OKCPD pin down a car thief, but Max was kind enough not to mention it when writing about our project. I have been forever grateful.
Next week, I will complete my list of the Paseo District’s “village people.”
Bert Belanger is a broker with Adept Commercial Real Estate and a real estate attorney with Riggs Abney (bbelanger@riggsabney.com).