Meet Jeff Moloznik, A Phoenix Community Alliance “City-Shaper”

To Jeff Moloznik, reinvention was taking shape Downtown.

In 2005, [now DPI Board Chair] Mike Ebert, Moloznik, and the rest of the RED Development team discovered Downtown Phoenix through First Fridays, a monthly art walk where creatives open their studios and galleries in the Roosevelt Arts District to the public. The groundswell was happening organically, without direction or guardrails.

Simultaneously, their vision of CityScape, a 1.2 million square foot mixed-use entertainment center, was germinating into reality. In time, the project would recalibrate Downtown Phoenix’s perception as a business hub into a vibrant and walkable urban environment.

As the Senior Vice President of Development, Moloznik helped sow the seeds of signature projects, including CityScape, Block 23, Fry’s Food Store, and an upcoming Community Resource Hub, which continue to sprout local equity almost two decades later.

Phoenix Community Alliance (PCA) was built on the foundation of industry professionals who all shared the same goal: to use their expertise to benefit the Greater Downtown Phoenix community.

RED Development’s Senior Vice President of Development Jeff Moloznik pictured outside the Downtown Phoenix, Inc./Phoenix Community Alliance (PCA) offices. (Photo: Taylor Costello)

PCA: How did you get your start with RED Development?

Jeff Moloznik: I found myself in Omaha, Nebraska, trying to get into the real estate business. In 2004, RED Development was under construction on an open-air lifestyle center that was very similar to Kierland [Commons], and that’s when I met Mike Ebert for the first time.

One thing led to another, and I was hired in September 2005 to be a development manager, the first rung on the ladder in project management. Essentially, you’re task-managing the things consultants have to do.

When we first moved here, after four years in Manhattan, I naturally thought, “Let’s find a place in Downtown Phoenix.” You think you go to a Downtown by default if you’re new to a place, yet there was no inventory.

PCA: At that point, you’re on the far-flung edges of the city with other projects. What was your first introduction to Downtown Phoenix?

Moloznik: We got bit by the Downtown bug because of First Friday. We came down from Scottsdale [in 2005, where our office was] to look at the [CityScape] site and were blown away.

At that moment, we said this art movement would propel Downtown. There’s always an undercurrent of the private sector business community embracing the arts. When we went through the public process for this project, they were almost as vested as we were.

It’s such a small community, and it still is. We were outsiders, and we didn’t want to alienate the people who gave it its real spark.

Different Eras, Different Building Ethos: The former Downtown building code required integrating an arcade into a building design that hid pedestrians 30 feet from the curb. As RED Development develops CityScape, their advocacy for the project shifts Downtown building codes toward more vibrancy and walkability. (Photos: Taylor Costello)

PCA: How did CityScape pick up momentum as a project?

Moloznik: The critical thing was that Downtown had no walkable retail amenities and restaurants. If you wanted to go to Kincaid’s [a space now occupied by Mancuso’s], you’d have to drive from somewhere else. That was eye-opening from a personal standpoint.

We’ve always said, “We didn’t invent anything new; we just invented something new for Phoenix.” We were the only high-rise under construction then; the last one built was almost ten years prior. But the blessing was that we got an enthusiastic group of planners, inspectors, fire marshals, and everybody down the line rooting for us.

It was a watershed moment because the Downtown Phoenix building code didn’t allow you to build what we built. We had to process 17 variances through the City of Phoenix to have zero setbacks [from the street] to the property.

You couldn’t get a variance approved unless you showed hardship, so our big push [to the city] was to say, “Pick a city, and there’s a building, a sidewalk, and then the street.”

We had to demonstrate our inability to lease retail and restaurant space without a traditional Downtown dining patio. We wanted to create a brand presence that people could see in a car or on foot, but no one would know if we couldn’t do that.

That led to a broader discussion of the building code during Vice Mayor Deb Starks’ time as Planning Director. She really led a complete redo of the entire code, so you don’t have to go through the process [that we went through] to build projects like this.

The timing was perfect for us to have a progressive planning director who was tuned in to what was happening throughout the country and wanted to see the same thing here.

A collection of photos from 2008 through 2011 shows the shifting scale of walkability that CityScape brought to Downtown. To the west of Central Avenue, the project was developed upon the existing parking structure under the former Patriot Square Park. The husk of the former park is visible in the main photo. (Photos: Downtown Phoenix Archives)

PCA: The opening of the first grocery store in Downtown that would serve the broadest swath of our community was inevitable. How did Fry’s Food Store and Block 23 come about? Where did the scrapped AJ’s Fine Food plans fit into the scheme?

Moloznik: Even [when we started developing CityScape] in 2005, we knew how badly Downtown needed a grocery store, so we pursued whichever would come first.

Where Stand Up Live, Copper Blues, and Chico Malo are now, that whole section was designed as a two-story building for AJ’s. We were about 30 days from construction when Bashas’ declared bankruptcy [in 2009].

[Later] in the recession, we acquired Camelback Colonnade [for renovations], and Fry’s wanted [us] to restore their store [there].

When that finished [around 2015], they were saying, “We think it’s time to reassess Downtown.” When they said that, we immediately looked out the window at Block 23 and said, “If this is a possibility, the place that could have the greatest chance of success is right there.”

The evacuation of the Block 23 site, pictured Thursday, January 11, 2018. (Photo: Downtown Phoenix Archives)

We told [Fry’s] they could pick the corner, and we would buy the block. And sure enough, they chose the one we thought they would across the street from Arrogant Butcher and the [Footprint Center]. Then, we built and designed the rest of that project around everything they needed.

If you notice, there are no columns between any two parking stalls. They couldn’t have customers pulling into a parking stall and having a column by their door as they unload groceries. We ended up with a massive 60ft column span that carries through to the office floors.

It was a center of gravity moment for us [to do whatever it took to make the project work] because we knew that tectonic shift would bring new people wanting to live here.

PCA: Did RED Development need to check any boxes when contemplating what dining concepts would go into a project like CityScape?

Moloznik: Not necessarily. This goes back to First Fridays and the local community ethos; we knew we needed a consortium of operators committed to Downtown. You needed that to persevere.

It was less about ‘what’ and more about ‘who’ because the ‘who’ is what ultimately drove it. Kyle Shivers, who owns The Breakfast Club, is a great example. It’s just breakfast, but it’s fast, not expensive, and they execute it extremely well.

The pent-up demand for a Downtown grocery store is apparent in the turnout at Fry’s Food Stores grand opening, pictured Wednesday, October 23, 2019. (Photo: Tom Tingle)

The Downtown consumer’s palate is amazing, unlike anywhere else. It doesn’t matter that I can’t park in front of your restaurant; I still want to go there. You see that with a place like Bacanora.

In our mind, that’s what the Downtown consumer is all about. They will reward you for consistency and quality.

PCA: Activations, like CitySkate, mark a location as a RED Development property. What sparked the company to create placemaking experiences at their properties?

Moloznik: It hearkens back to those retail roots when we were developing in the Midwest. The project I met Mike Ebert at was called Village Point. In the early 2000s, it was built on the edge of suburban Omaha. It didn’t have a core or a sense of community.

The retailers would bring people to the center, but we always wanted to create a layer on top of the retailers. We made a big splash by hosting outdoor events all year round, which was unheard of. It was a gathering place.

All the activations we’re doing are a part of our company’s DNA. [After Cityscape was completed,] we pushed hard to create events that would bring people Downtown who didn’t work here to see the difference from 2005 to 2010.

Examples of how RED Development has activated CityScape since its opening include CitySkate, the Cornhole Cup, Surf on Central, Jazz in the Park, and the Over the Edge Challenge. (Photos: Fara Illich, Downtown Phoenix Archives, Michael Schennum, and Taylor Costello)

CityScape has all the elements to do that on a grander scale, which we don’t have anywhere else. It has activators on top of activators, like the Suns arena. And there’s no downside to giving it a shot because everybody gets entertained, whether it works or not.

The ice rink resulted from idle time in City Council chambers, where we were waiting to have a project heard. Mike Ebert sketched it out on a napkin and asked what I thought. I didn’t know if we could pull it off, but it would be a statement because ice skating in the middle of Arizona was something no one thought was possible. And it just so happened that the guys that operate rinks across the country are based out of Tempe.

You can’t underwrite the value it creates. The intangibles have always made this place a success.

There are still pieces to the Downtown puzzle for RED Development to fill.

In the fall, a new ground-floor Community Resource Hub will operate below the Downtown Phoenix, Inc. (DPI) office at CityScape. The hub will be operated in financial partnership with DPI, RED Development, and Valley Metro.

Inside, the space houses a variety of essential stakeholders, from hospitality (Downtown Phoenix Ambassadors) to assisting public transportation users arriving into the Downtown core (Valley Metro) to a workplace development program for those with disabilities (Phoenix Union High School District’s Upward & Onward), to Phoenix Police Department’s Downtown Operations Unit.

In addition, several service providers, including the City of Phoenix’s Community Assistance Program (CAP), a team providing on-site crisis intervention, victim/advocacy services, and behavior health assistance services, and DPI’s dehp Outreach Navigators, who support individuals experiencing homelessness, will work from the space.

Their collective presence within Downtown is a given, a place with a larger shared purpose and responsibility.

According to Moloznik, within the establishment of the hub is the implicit understanding that stakeholders must provide a service, in counterpart to the City of Phoenix.

It’s a natural extension of his sense of community obligation that exposes him to different perspectives, whether as a member of the Fire Safety Advisory Committee or the Enhanced Municipal Services District (EMSD) Advisory Board.

“The bond you develop from giving your time versus your money is different and immensely more valuable.”

RED Development’s Jeff Moloznik and Mike Ebert, pictured alongside City of Phoenix’s Community and Economic Development staff, Christine MacKay, second left, and Karla Scott, far right, at PCA’s 40th A Celebration of 40 Years event, pictured Thursday, October 5, 2023. (Photo: Zee Peralta)