Black Fresno developer sues city, says racism and loss of millions impacted business
A Fresno developer who previously butted heads with city officials has filed a lawsuit alleging racism is behind city actions that have cost him millions.
According to the suit filed by Terance Frazier, an unfinished audit related to Granite Park was released by Fresno Mayor Lee Brand’s administration, costing him about $4.3 million.
The suit, filed Friday in U.S. Eastern District Court in Fresno, states the audit affected Frazier’s reputation and cost about $6.7 million to Central Valley Community Sports Foundation, the nonprofit that runs Granite Park, according to the lawsuit.
At the heart of the mistreatment of Frazier, who is Black, is racism, the lawsuit says.
No white developer in a similar situation as Frazier has been treated the same way, the suit alleges.
Named in the lawsuit are Brand, City Manager Wilma Quan, Assistant City Manager Jim Schaad and Chief of Staff Tim Orman.
Spokesperson Mark Standriff declined to comment Monday, which is the city’s policy for ongoing litigation.
The long troubled Granite Park has been a source of contention between city leaders and Frazier.
The city audited the park’s performance from January 2016 to July 2018. Frazier’s attorney Kevin Little said the audit was not only incomplete when it was made public, but was done improperly because the process should have used random sampling.
“When Mr. Frazier exercised his contractual and constitutional rights to seek redress from the city of Fresno, the city responded with two old standbys: retaliation and racism,” Little said Monday.
“This audit was in fact a fishing expedition to find ways to break the contract now that Frazier and (the foundation) had made Granite Park viable again,” he said.
The audit released in January 2019 found personal loans, missing documents, questionable spending and a large amount of unaccounted money. The nonprofit’s accounting practices looked “not ethical,” according to the audit.
Frazier and the foundation put more than $2 million into improving the park and the city never came through on its end to provide recycled water or allow advertising on park billboards, the suit says.
The audit was never completed and in November 2018 was put on hold, according to the lawsuit. Around the same time, an old business partner who had a falling out with Frazier filed a public records request and got the draft audit, the lawsuit claims.
Because the audit was unfinished, the suit maintains it should not have been released. The incomplete audit was then made public by the former business partner, the lawsuit says.
Brand’s administration wanted Frazier out of the contract for Granite Park so officials could offer the stadium to Fresno Football Club or another developer, according to the lawsuit. The Fresno Foxes left the city in late 2019.
The lawsuit is requesting unspecified damages.
Other contract
Frazier has other dealings with the city. About a year ago, the City Council voted to give $659,298 to another company of Frazier’s. Noyan Frazier Capital LP, a development company run by Mehmet Noyan and Frazier, was awarded low-income housing funds for a downtown apartment building.
Frazier’s downtown project could benefit from about $1.6 million in public money, including the waiving of developer fees and state grant money, which the council voted on in 2016.
Frazier is engaged to Fresno City Councilmember Esmeralda Soria.
This story was originally published August 3, 2020 at 12:43 PM.
