One of the last two bidders now being considered to remake San Diego’s vacant 101 Ash St. high-rise into affordable housing is a major campaign contributor and was accused of violating ground lease terms in another jurisdiction. The other is run by a political appointee of Mayor Todd Gloria. Both companies on the short list to redevelop the controversial property owned by San Diego taxpayers — the Affirmed Housing Group and Create Dev — stand to invest millions of dollars if they are selected. Gloria administration officials did not respond to questions about why Create principal Kelly Moden was chosen as a finalist in the Ash Street project. The mayor appointed her to the city Planning Commission two years ago. Senior mayoral aides also declined to address accusations from residents and city officials in Carlsbad that Affirmed Housing violated lease terms of a deal in that city. In response to the emailed questions, Gloria spokesperson Rachel Laing did not explain why the San Diego Housing Commission is not involved in the proposed conversion of 101 Ash St. but said the mayor is relying on the same consultant hired by the commission. “It’s too early to say whether or not SDHC ultimately will be involved; their expertise or involvement may be called upon, depending on the structure of any agreement,” she added. Housing Commission spokesperson Scott Marshall confirmed that the agency is not involved in the reconstruction effort. He referred questions to the city’s Economic Development Department. The mayor’s spokesperson said the hundreds of thousands of dollars Affirmed has donated to elected officials and campaigns in recent years had no bearing on the city’s evaluation of the company’s bid to redevelop 101 Ash St. “The answer to whether campaign contributions are a factor in which proposals moved forward: For this and every case — past, present and future — absolutely not,” Laing said. The question has arisen before. Two years ago, the Gloria administration selected Midway Rising to remake almost 50 acres surrounding Pechanga Arena after a principal in that development group contributed more than $200,000 to help elect the mayor. The last two 101 Ash St. bidders became public earlier this month, when The San Diego Union-Tribune reported that Gloria had rejected an unsolicited offer to buy the 19-story mid-century high-rise. Leonard Bloom, a longtime San Diego orthodontist, businessman and sports mogul, had offered the city $10 million in cash for the building and planned to invest tens of millions more to develop a privately funded 800-unit supportive housing project to serve homeless people. His proposed purchase price was well below the $128 million the city agreed to pay under its initial lease, and the $200 million-plus it has spent to maintain the building and finance the subsequent lease buyout. Bloom said he could have opened his private homeless center within 16 months of city approval, but the sales pitch was rejected by the mayor and City Council last month. “In addition to being unable to demonstrate in any way the viability of his endeavor beyond the $10 million cash payment to the city, Dr. Bloom has no track record to evaluate on a project of this type or scale,” Laing said at the time. Bloom disputed the city’s characterization of his proposal. “It’s time to think outside the box, and that’s why I proposed we convert 101 Ash St. into apartments for the homeless,” he said. “Solving homelessness requires new thinking, and that’s what our Homeless No More project brings to San Diego.” All three of the redevelopment proposals — from Bloom, Affirmed and Create — were submitted to the city as unsolicited bids earlier this year, and only after negotiations with another investor fizzled, Laing said. The mayor has not committed to choosing either of the two remaining bidders, she said. “This period is an opportunity to demonstrate that their proposal will in fact benefit the public and that the firms have the financial and operational capacity of carrying it out,” Laing said. “We haven’t entered an exclusive negotiating agreement with either party — and there’s no guarantee such a time will ever come.” Neither Affirmed nor Create has released details of their Ash Street proposals — number of units, construction cost, public contributions or timetables. Presumably, they resemble prior subsidized housing projects that include hundreds of units for low-income people and families with decades-long rent restrictions in exchange for low-interest loans, tax credits and other incentives. A spokesperson for Create, which submitted its bid with national homebuilder MRK Partners, said there is no conflict of interest between Moden’s work as a city planning commissioner and her role running a company redeveloping a major city project. “As this will not come before the Planning Commission, there is no conflict as confirmed by the Ethics Commission,” company spokesperson Stefanie Benvenuto wrote in an email. But Sharon Spivak, the Ethics Commission executive director, sought to clarify that determination when asked by the Union-Tribune. She said in a statement that advice is narrowly tailored to the question specifically posed to her office. “To the extent that the applicant represented that the bid is solely to purchase the property, and the land purchase transaction would not come before the Planning Commission, the conflict of interest provisions of the Ethics Commission are not implicated by the bid alone,” Spivak wrote. “Any future transactions related to the property would need to be analyzed,” she added. “The Ethics Commission often advises that there can also be optics issues in given situations.” The City Attorney’s Office did not respond to questions about a potential conflict of interest. Before launching Create, which was established in 2017 and promotes itself as cREate development, Moden worked as an executive at the San Diego homebuilder Community HousingWorks. According to her company website, she managed more than $500 million in real estate transactions and underwrote hundreds of millions of dollars worth of real estate acquisitions and redevelopment deals. MRK Partners, with offices in Los Angeles and Boca Raton, Fla., has developed more than 6,000 units over the past decade, including a 179-unit affordable housing project for seniors with Create in Northern California. Affirmed Housing said it is on the mayor’s short list for remaking Ash Street because it has a decadeslong history of developing homes across San Diego and direct experience repurposing challenging properties. “We know how to manage costs and provide high-quality homes and amenities utilizing local, trained workers to do the job,” Affirmed spokesperson Bryna Geary said in a statement. Geary said Affirmed built more than 20 projects in the city of San Diego, and its most recent developments cost an average of $536,000 per unit. That average — which is broadly in line with other Housing Commission projects — is far exceeded by one Affirmed job now under way in Rancho Bernardo. The 100-unit effort dubbed SkyLINE costs just under $91 million, or $909,000 per unit, company records show. Affirmed has an in-house construction arm that contributes to its bottom line. The company also donates handsomely to political candidates and campaigns, including $10,000 to a committee in support of Gloria’s re-election effort in February. In all, the developer has donated over $500,000 in the past three years, state campaign records show. Geary said the company’s track record speaks for itself. “Affirmed Housing has been delivering quality communities since 1992,” she said. “As San Diegans, and out of deep care for our region, we support causes, candidates and organizations that will help uplift communities without regard for self-benefit.” Not every Affirmed Housing development has been a hit with local communities. The homebuilder’s Windsor Pointe project in Carlsbad was accused by city officials in September of violating terms of its lease agreement after it received permits to develop that project. Among other problems, Affirmed failed to properly secure the property, make routine repairs and keep the development clean and orderly, the city alleged. The company implemented some changes but not enough to satisfy the city. “The uncured and additional security, maintenance and operations deficiencies violate the provisions of Affirmed Housing agreements with the city,” Carlsbad City Attorney Cindie K. McMahon told the company and its lawyers in an Oct. 17 letter.