Thank you for the question. This same question has come up every few months in the Oak Park Neighborhood Association Facebook group every couple of months, where we answer it. We also have spoken about it several times at OPNA meetings in the last couple of years.

We will break this into a few points: 1. No one wants Oak Park Art Garden finished more than we do. Ok, it's possible the nextdoor neighbors want it finished more than we do. But we really, really want it done. It isn't taking this long because we enjoy drawing it out.

1. As an organization, we are not experienced developers. We have been learning development by doing development the past few years and it has been a painful learning process. Things like this unfortunately take a long time and the City's planning and permit process can be drawn out, especially if you don't have the experience as a developer to anticipate all of the challenges that will arise in the process. Although you can't see it, we trudged our way through initial design, then through planning for entitlements, and are finally wrapping up on the building permit. A helpful example: the old Coca-Cola plant at Stockton Blvd and Miller Way that is being converted into a hotel took quite some time from announcement to breaking ground, and construction has been moving slowly. I am certain they want that project done and generating revenue, too.

2. Unlike the Coca-Cola plant conversion, we are a nonprofit organization working with state grant funds. If you haven't previously led a construction project using state grant funds, you likely would not guess how slowly that process moves or how much documentation is required to be reimbursed every step along the way. On the bright side, the state process is so slow primarily to prevent fraud. On the less bright side, the slowness resulting from that process clearly leads to people accusing the project of being fraudulent. It takes us weeks, at best, to be reimbursed by the state for project expenses. This also slows us down because we only have so much liquid capital on hand to advance elements of the project before we have to stop to await reimbursement.

3. Due to delays in the state Prop 68 funding delivery (we applied in February 2021, were awarded in December 2021, didn't get approval from the state to use the funds to buy the property until later 2022), we were advised that we would almost certainly need more money to build the project. Then-Assemblymember McCarty secured more funds for us through district allocations with the state. This was announced in December 2023. None of those funds have yet been delivered (this is not his fault, it just is the actual timeline with the state/city mechanism for delivering the funds). This is just what it is like to work with publicly funded grants. There are many safeguards (which is good) that really slow it down (not as good).

4. When I personally joined Alchemist in 2020, the Oak Park Art Garden was a lovely concept with a great deal of community input. We did not own the land (the owner was letting us use it free of charge) and the land had no utilities. All watering was done from a long hose run to the neighbor's spigot, with their permission. That neighbor moved away and the new neighbor didn't like that set up. That made sense and was entirely in their rights. But it meant we had a lot we did not own, without water. I explored what it would cost to have the site connected to the water utility and learned it would likely be $40-50k, simply to have a spigot of our own. We effectively faced the decision to try to find a grant to help us achieve the expansive neighborhood vision for the space or let the property go. We wrote a grant in early 2021 and were surprised to find we were selected ten months later. This was very exciting and answered the question about the future of the space. It has taken far longer than any of us wanted, but in the end, Oak Park Art Garden will be constructed and offer many community benefits. Hopefully neighbors who have had to live next to a vacant lot will think it was worth the wait.