Shopping mall in California, United States
Indian Hill Village is a former shopping mall in Pomona, California. It has been redeveloped into a multi-use retail, commercial and educational facility and is now known as The Village @ Indian Hill, comprising 650,000 square feet (60,000 m2) on 39 acres (16 ha).
History
The original, open-air mall was built in the mid-1950s as Pomona Valley Center. Its anchor store, a 111,500-square-foot (10,360 m2) Sears, had been dedicated in November 1954. Inline stores included Long's Drugs, F.C. Nash and J.J. Newberry. Between 1967 and 1969, the mall was expanded westward. A 100,000-square-foot (9,300 m2) Zody's discount store opened in June 1969, as the center's second anchor. One year later, the F.C. Nash store was sold to Roberts Department Store.[2]
In 1974, the mall was renamed to Indian Hill Village, a name chosen by the mall owners in a contest.[3] An enclosing renovation was completed in September 1982. The project was described as "the largest single commercial development in the city's history".[4] In 1985, Sears moved to the Montclair Plaza Mall.
In 1995, part of the property was acquired by the Pomona Unified School District,[5] which created the nonprofit Pomona Valley Educational Foundation to manage it; the foundation was dissolved in 2010.[6] The conversion of the failing mall into an "impressive" educational facility has been cited as one of the chief accomplishments of then-school superintendent Patrick Leier.[7]
The expanded property now houses multiple educational facilities which serve more than 2,000 students in grades pre-Kindergarten to 14.[5] An eight-screen movie theater formerly in the mall was closed in September 2005, prompting the theater owner to sue the school district, alleging that the lease had been improperly terminated.[8]
