Eric Duyshart, Economic Development Manager

Pasadena, a city of approximately 137,000 is bursting with construction and development.  Eric gave the Arcadia Rotarians an overview of the many projects under development.

With vacancy rates below 10%, and Financial, Insurance and Professional growing, competition for quality lease or purchase space is intense.  Some of the specific businesses noted by Eric included:

Open X; Bluebeam; Everbridge; STIR; Tetra Tech; Art & Logic; Calimmune (a Caltech spinoff); Spoked; International Design Tools; Got Astronomy; MISO Robotics; STROBE (now GM’s Lidar technology); Virtualitics; UBER Media; iRobot; Idea Lab; Alexandria REIT and a few more.

Newer businesses to Pasadena included: Huntington Memorial Research Institute (HMRI); Kaiser Permanente school of medicine; Doheny Eye Institute; Art Center Campus; Culinary Training Resources, Institute of Culinary Education (ICE); and several large hotels under permitting and construction.

• Hyatt Place
• DusitD2 Constance Hotel
• 2 Hotels at the old Ford dealership site on Foothill
• The old Space Bank self storage site now a 500 unit appartment

Pasadena gets a very high “Walker’s Paradise” 96 Walk Score and businesses are locating near transit options to attract quality employees.  The city has 6 Goldline rail stops, PCC the community college and is rated as one of the 30 most fun cities in the nation.

Questions were ask of Mr. Duyshart related to:

• Traffic: average is so-so, peak not good
• 710 Extension: Defunded by the state
• PCC: In transition to more transferrable courses
• Fuller Seminary: Moving to Pomona
• Avon Facility: Bought by Home Depot
• Minimum wage: Went with LA to increase

Esteemed President Patrick Dolphin thanked Mr. Duyshart for his excellent presentation and noted that a donation to Habitat for Humanity is being made in his name from the Arcadia Rotary Club.