HUNTINGTON BEACH : ‘Shrine’ a Target for Condemnation

To local historians, it’s the city’s first city hall. To preservationists, it’s one of the oldest buildings in the city. To redevelopment officials, it’s an obsolete building that must be modernized or replaced.

But to 78-year-old Charles Sarrabere, it’s a family shrine--the place where his French immigrant father started business in 1916.

“I was practically raised there,” said Sarrabere, who took over his father’s dry-cleaning business in 1935 and ran it until he retired in 1981.

The small shop at 122 Main St., now known as Diamond Lane clothing shop, is one of five downtown buildings owned by the Sarrabere family. Three are targeted for condemnation as part of the city’s Main-Pier Redevelopment Project.

“I guess you can’t stop progress,” Sarrabere said. “And downtown is getting pretty old.”

Sarrabere’s father used his profits to buy Huntington Beach real estate. Now his descendants--Charles Sarrabere, his sister Blanche Wood and their niece, Helene Goodman--own the buildings: two on Main Street and one at Pacific Coast Highway and 5th Street, site of the family’s old home.

Preservationists are interested in the old dry-cleaning store. It not only is among the city’s oldest remaining buildings, built about 1902, but it originally was City Hall for Pacific City, as Huntington Beach was known from 1901 to 1905.

“That building was one of the very first on Main Street,” said Douglas Langevin, a downtown businessman and historic-preservation activist. “It’s one of very few of the original wood structures left in the city. . . . In my view, that is the most important (of the old wooden buildings), given its history with the city.”

The face of the two-story building was remodeled decades ago, but the structure’s walls are original, according to historical studies.

Under the redevelopment plan, owners may retain their buildings during remodeling if they help pay for the upgrade in advance. Advance payments average $1 million per building, and the family says it has no interest in making such an investment.

Wood, widow of former Huntington Beach City councilman Herbert Wood, said she discussed having the building registered as a historical landmark, which would block condemnation, “but I didn’t really know what to do, so we just figured, well, whatever’s best.”

Langevin said that as a last resort he may try to buy the building and restore it. But the family says it may sell the city all three properties and let redevelopment run its course.

“It’s a sentimental thing,” Sarrabere said. “It’s part of my life, and I hate to part with it.”

On the other hand, he said: “I feel we should be paid for what the building will be worth four or five years from now. We’re going to sell it (and) a developer will make all the money off it, and you’re out.”

Wood added that after refusing to sell her father’s properties for so many years, it pains her to do so now.

“We’ve always stuck together and held onto them,” she said. “I know this is a new era, and we have to move on. The thing is, it’s not because we want to, but because we have to.”