RITTER RANCH PLAN UP FOR SALE BIDS SET TO START AT $10 MILLION FOR DEVELOPMENT.Byline: Charles F. Bostwick Staff Writer PALMDALE - Eight years of financial problems, legal maneuvers and bankruptcy proceedings bankruptcy proceedings n. the bankruptcy procedure is: a) filing a petition (voluntary or involuntary) to declare a debtor person or business bankrupt, or, under Chapter 11 or 13, to allow reorganization or refinancing under a plan to meet the debts of the party that have delayed the 7,200-home Ritter rit·ter n. pl. ritter A knight. [German, from Middle High German riter, from Middle Dutch ridder, from r Ranch master-planned community could end Thursday with an auction in bankruptcy court bankruptcy court n. the specialized Federal court in which bankruptcy matters under the Federal Bankruptcy Act are conducted. There are several bankruptcy courts in each state, and each one's territory covers several counties. . Six companies, including the developers of the neighboring 5,200-home Anaverde master-planned community and two companies owed money under the project, have qualified to bid for the giant development, for which the minimum bid is $10 million. ``It should be pretty interesting what happens,'' said Palmdale City Attorney Matt Ditzhazy, who will attend the U.S. Bankruptcy Court proceedings in Woodland Hills. Covering 18 square miles of rolling hills Rolling hills are like a mountain chain, only a "hill chain" of hills that roll on and on continually. You will often find them in between plains and mountains, near major rivers, or randomly anywhere. The only places without rolling hills are deserts and flood plains. and valleys west of Palmdale along Elizabeth Lake Road, Ritter Ranch was originally proposed during the Antelope Valley's housing boom of the 1980s. Estimated to cost $1.4 billion 10 years ago, the Ritter Ranch project was envisioned as a master-planned community, offering a range of upscale homes, an 18-hole golf course, an outdoor amphitheater, seven schools and 7,500 acres of open space for bike, horse and hiking trails. The developers fought a legal battle with Leona Valley residents who said the development would destroy their town's rural atmosphere and started preliminary work in 1995, only to halt it a year later amid financial problems. Two companies tried to restart the development but couldn't get financiers to put up the money. Bankruptcy proceedings and the court squabbling by companies with financial interests in the property or with interests in taking it over caused further delays. A scheduled sale in 2003 never occurred. Thursday's auction will start with a $10 million bid from a company called RR Property Holdings, whose owners include a company that owns millions of dollars worth of bonds issued to finance Ritter Ranch streets, storm drains and other work, Ditzhazy said. The other five companies will try to top RR's bid, starting at $10.5 million and going up from there in $100,000 increments. The other companies include Anaverde LLC (Logical Link Control) See "LANs" under data link protocol. LLC - Logical Link Control , the partnership that is building the 5,200-home Anaverde development adjoining Ritter to the east, and Laminar laminar /lam·i·nar/ (lam´i-nar) 1. pertaining to a lamina or laminae. 2. laminated. 3. of, pertaining to, or being a streamlined, smooth fluid flow. Acquisitions, whose owners include a company that acquired the Ritter Ranch's underlying lien from the trust that assembled the land originally. Other qualified bidders are SCC SCC - strongly connected component Acquisitions Inc., BCMM BCMM Business Continuity Maturity Model (Virtual Corporation) BCMM Boundary Contour Mode-Matching BCMM Bachelor of Communications and Media Management Partners LLC and Merco Group-Palmdale LLC. Besides covering the purchase price, the bidders had to prove they had $8 million to cover the first two years of bond payments and an additional $15 million to $25 million for the first year of development, Ditzhazy said. Laminar and Merco were given an extra 60 days to find a developer partner if they win the auction. City officials don't know Don't know (DK, DKed) "Don't know the trade." A Street expression used whenever one party lacks knowledge of a trade or receives conflicting instructions from the other party. when construction might start if the auction produces a new Ritter Ranch owner. ``No one has really said. I think all of them intend to go ... as rapidly as possible,'' Ditzhazy said. CAPTION(S): map Map: (ran in AV edition only) Ritter Ranch Daily News |
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