Wal-Mart on sidelines, Inglewood OKs other projects.

Having rebuffed efforts by Wal-Mart Stores Inc. to open a supercenter next to Hollywood Park, the city of Inglewood has approved nearly $135 million of new development around the site that could result in greater job and wage gains.

And there are signs Wal-Mart has not given up on the city.

In the last two weeks, the Inglewood City Council has approved plans for a 193,000-square-foot mall on Century Boulevard between Club Drive and Woodworth Avenue and voted to authorize exclusive negotiations for development of a 140,000-square-foot medical office building and surgical center and a 14-screen movie theater on three city parcels along Century Boulevard and 102nd Street.

"We are rolling out the red carpet to business," said Mayor Roosevelt Dorn. "These are good paying jobs and we're creating more synergy in an area where we hope more businesses will want to locate."

The activity comes on the heels of Wal-Mart's decisive defeat in an April 5 special ballot that would have overridden existing zoning laws to allow construction of a supercenter as large as 200,000 square feet at the southeast corner of 90th Street and Prairie Avenue.

But rather than turning its back on the site, the Bentonville, Ark.-based company, through Rothbart Development Corp., closed on its $36 million acquisition of the property in late May, according to an official of the seller, Pinnacle Entertainment Inc.

Rothbart, which has developed several projects for Wal-Mart in Southern California, put a $3 million deposit on the site in June 2002, which it would have lost had it not completed the transaction, according to the Pinnacle official.

Stanley Rothbart, the company's president, didn't return a call seeking comment.

Peter Kanelos, a Wal-Mart spokesman, said the company had no immediate plans for the site. "'We purchased it because it's a good investment and we wanted to preserve all our options," he said, "but no decision has been made about what to do with that property."

Dorn said he heard Wal-Mart might want to build one of its regular, 85,000-square-foot big box stores on the site, though that, too, would require special approvals. He reiterated a desire for Wal-Mart to use unionized construction and pay its employees competitive salaries in the city, issues that forced the ballot measure.

"I don't think you'd buy the land if it meant you were walking away," said Inglewood Chamber of Commerce President David Stewart, a Wal-Mart proponent.

Andrew J. Natker, a senior vice president at Haagen Co. LLC, which just received entitlements for the mall development, said the firm expects to break ground on the $35 million project by mid-September.

The company has estimated that the project would result in 1.300 construction jobs and 1,2(X) full- and part-time positions at its retail stores and restaurants.

Natker said Haagen has signed leases with retailers Bed Bath & Beyond, Ross Dress for Less, Marshalls and Michael's Stores Inc., and restaurants Chili's, Red Lobster and Coldstone Creamery. The company is also in talks with Carl's Jr., Chili Verde, Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf and Golden Corral Family Buffet, he said. Imperial Partners LLC, negotiating with the city for the right to build the medical complex and movie theater, is also looking to buy a block of privately owned land between Prairie and Yukon avenues, where it would build a 300-room hotel, 10-story parking structure and a 120,000-square-foot mall, according to its managing partner, John McDonald.

All told, McDonald said Imperial Partners' project could cost upwards of $100 million.

"This is a market that has been underserved for years," said McDonald. "Inglewood is the largest city in the state without a movie theater."

He said that the office, surgical center and movie theater components would create 350 construction jobs and result in 600 full-time jobs.

While the retail, restaurant and movie theater jobs wouldn't pay much more than Wal-Mart, Dorn said, the medical facilities are expected to generate higher-salary positions.

Already under way is Watt Development Co.'s 200 single-family home development on a 38-acre West 90th Street site.