Mike Harrah

Newsong Church Backs Out of Purchase of Santora Arts Building

After months of protest by Santa Ana arts crusaders, Irvine-based Newsong Church is terminating escrow and no longer pursuing the purchase of the Santora Arts Building. "After extensive due diligence efforts, we were not able to come to terms with the seller of the Santora Arts Building re ... More >>

Out of Tune? Newsong Church in Irvine May Snap Up Santora Arts Building in Santa Ana

Faithful readers will recall the fantastic story Michelle Woo wrote about Dave Gibbons, the founder and pastor of Newsong, the Irvine-based megachurch that about seven years ago was named one of the 100 fastest-growing churches in America by Outreach Magazine.The church may soon be singing their son ... More >>

Is Mike Harrah Preparing to Sell the Santora Building to Free Up Money for One Broadway Plaza?

​The big rumor going around SanTana's Artist's Village is that Mike Harrah--once a proverbial lord of real estate in the city, but more like King Lear in recent years as he's been unloading property to raise funds for his much-promised, much-desired 37-story Freudian monument to himself, One Broad ... More >>

Construction Finally Begins on One Broadway Plaza!

​After years and years of shady dealings, bellowing promises, and more dirty money funneled toward the political process than stars in the sky, construction on the Freudian edifice known as One Broadway Plaza has officially begun. The stunning development (the actual construction, not the building ... More >>

Santa Ana Artists Ask City to Recommit Itself to the Artists Village, Claiming Arts is Endangered There

​Tomorrow, downtown SanTana will see its monthly First Saturday, which has all the galleries in the Artists Village open their doors to thousands. But not everyone will be happy--and I'm not talking about the folks gnashing their teeth about gentrification.Feeling lost in the city's continued push ... More >>

Time to Occupy Mike Harrah?

​Cranes and heavy machinery are finally moving at the massive lot on the corner of Broadway and 10th Street in SanTana owned by Mike Harrah, the mega-developer intent on building on that site a 37-story Freudian eyesore called One Broadway Plaza--never mind it's right next to a high school and acr ... More >>

Will One Broadway Plaza, Santa Ana Freudian Project for City Council, Finally Get Built?

​Wow, I gotta hop on the wayback machine to remember what was the first time I wrote about One Broadway Plaza, the proposed 37-story office tower in a residential SanTana neighborhood that would be the tallest building in Orange County history AND the biggest Freudian monument yet erected for the ... More >>

The OC Couple Who Gave More than $1.3 Million to the Church of Scientology--Only to Leave

​Over the past couple of weeks, the St. Petersburg Times has been publishing their latest blockbuster series on the Church of Scientology, that ever-mockable collection of has-been movie stars and good people being driven to donate more and more money just to realize an intergalatic overlord name ... More >>

Mike Harrah Claims He's Finally Found the Tenant That will Allow Him to Build 37-Story One Broadway Plaza

​Credit for this story goes to the Orange County Business Journal's Rick Reiff, who is actually breaking the news when Inside OC with Rick Reiff airs tomorrow at 1 p.m., which we taped this afternoon but he allowed me to pre-break because he's re-breaking the news in his Monday OCBJ column...wait, ... More >>

[UPDATED: An Artists' Perspective] Artists in Santa Ana Artists Village Cover Up for One of Their Own, Accused of Sexually Harassing Minors

Loopy Bautista​UPDATED: Andy Verostek, who leases a gallery in the Santora, has written a lengthy account of his take on the issue. He claims he was the first person to call the police after the incident happened, and that only the friends of the accused have defended him and not Santora artists i ... More >>

Grrl Fair Turns 10

[Mental Notes] Also, a new drummer for A7F, a new name for the Grove, and new nominees for the OCMAs

Mike Harrah Gets Fined for Illegal Signs on His Santora Building, Shrugs

From the Clockwork Coker Photoshop collection...​The Voice of OC has done a bang-up job the past couple of months reporting on the Banana Republic, and it finds itself in the same delicious situation we were in back in 2003: reporting on our unethical landlord, mega-developer Mike Harrah.Harrah's ... More >>

Another Reason why the Democratic Party of Orange County is Pathetic: Their Official Party is at Original Mike's

​Although we might come across as a left-of-left lefties, people who actually read the entirety of the Weekly know that we harbor a special animus toward local Democrats, who can boast of supporting corrupt politicians (SanTana Mayor-for-Life Don Papi Pulido, Irvine boss Larry Agran, convicted fel ... More >>

Sunday News Notes

​Highlights include:The Latest Grocery Store Scam KCBS Channel 2 in LA is promoting its Monday investigative look into an area grocery store that pretends to honor product coupons but actually credits the shopper $0.00. No word on the identity of the alleged offender. The report is scheduled to ... More >>

Boss Mike Harrah

[Moxley Confidential] Santa Ana sends a message to One Broadway Plaza's developer: Anything you say, sir

A New Twist for Original Mike's Bike Night

Wrong kind of bike, Mike.​Every Thursday night for the past several weeks, Original Mike's Restaurant--the Santa Ana comfort food spot owned by mega-downtown developer Mike Harrah--has hosted a "Bike Night" gathering of sports, touring and cruising motorcycles, their riders and their lovers. This ... More >>

Best Romantic Restaurants in OC in Anaheim and Santa Ana? HA!

Flickr photo from Mangrove Mike​Clockwork Coker did a post about megablog The Daily Beast's ridiculous assertion that Anaheim and SanTana are the second- and third-best cities in the United States to find love. Being that Anacrime is my hometown and SanTana my adopted one and given I know the fema ... More >>

Someone Stop Don Papi Pulido From Lubing Up Santa Ana For Mike Harrah--Again

Pulido: Pay your taxes!I'm supposed to be relaxing at the Parker Resort in Palm Springs, a beautiful lil' oasis where UC Riverside MFA program in creative writing is holding a writer's retreat (I'm an invited lecturer), but news that SanTana mayor Don Papi Pulido is busy lubing Orange County's seat ... More >>

Santa Ana Officials Don't Care For Viet Art, Dangerous Elevators

Too bad that the Weekly moved its world headquarters away from SanTana and back to Costa Mesa's industrial-park blackhole this week (although the offices we now occupy ain't that bad), because the best non-Carona story to emerge this weekend was the shutdown of the revolutionary FOB II art exhibit b ... More >>

Bisno-ess Not So Good For Controversial SanTana Developer

"What is it about SanTana's power structure that attracts them to moron landlords?" I wondered out loud as a friend drove up Broadway. We passed by a meticulously landscaped building--pretty really. But when it was owned by mega-landlord Mike Harrah a couple of years ago, the structure seemed pulle ... More >>

Ed McKie Has Been Stymied in His Efforts to Create a Safe Space for Gay Meth Addicts in Santa Ana

Some Words of Advice for Mike Harrah

Was walking up Main Street in SanTana the other day, and who was driving a massive Cadillac Escalade without a care to gas prices? None other than Mike Harrah, the Weekly's former landlord, one of many sugar papis to councilmember Claudia Alvarez, and the man who wants to build a 37-story building n ... More >>

Icky Vicky and the Renaissance Plan

Yesterday, we promised to investigate why SanTana officials were so adamant in redrawing the boundaries for its much-vaunted Renaissance Plan so that planning commissioner Victoria Bentacourt could vote it. Actually, we knew what we wanted to write, but there were football games to watch, broder! Bu ... More >>

The Renaissance Blob

A guide to Santa Ana's ambitious, conflict-of-interest-y downtown-redevelopment plan

Have Money, Will Vote: How Carlos Bustamante Pays Back Donors

Part dos of 3... Every day, we drive by City Place, the unfinished development across the street from MainPlace Mall with cool live/work lofts and horrid restaurants (seriously: McCormick & Schmidt's and Corner Bakery as the anchor tenants??? Can't wait 'til Mother's Market opens to save us from t ... More >>

The Gentrifying Gourmet

Learning to like Ambrosia

Messiah news: Real Estate and Sushi Edition

According to the Los Angeles Times, the Santa Ana Performing Arts and Event Center building may soon leave behind the things of this world, and take on the fight against the evil alien power from beyond the stars that's keeping you from fulfilling your potential and living like Tom Cruise. In other ... More >>

Costa Mesa

Santa Ana

Embrace the Mexican

Four ways to make Santa Ana the capital of Latino USA

Bare, Ruined Choirs

The historic buildings in the way of One Broadway Plaza were doomed
long before the vote on Measure A

Bare, Ruined Choirs

The historic buildings in the way of One Broadway Plaza were doomed long before the vote on Measure A

Architecturally Sound

Orange County can match LA County building for building

Espresso Your Love

Remembering paninis and the Italian boy who got away at Kaffa

Slapp-Happy

Anti-tower activists claim developer and friends are suing them into silence

Out of the Park

Developers Eye Public Parks

Letters

Letters

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A hodgepodge o crap!