​Elliot Feuerstein is a Southern California entrepreneur who serves as Mira Mesa Shopping Center officer and oversees complex real estate development projects. Based in San Diego, CA, Elliot Feuerstein maintains a strong philanthropic presence and contributes to the San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance.

Tracing its origins back to animal exhibits arranged by Dr. Harry Wegeforth for the 1915 Panama-California International Exposition, the Zoological Society of San Diego was incorporated the following year and moved to Balboa Park, its present location, in 1922. A decade later, the growing zoo encountered a major financial test that almost led to its dissolution.

Owing more than $6,000 in back taxes to the county, the zoo held an auction that aimed to sell all its animals and related fixtures and inventory, “including hay for the elephants.” With no bids tendered and the future of the zoo uncertain, penalty process assessor James Hervey Johnson announced the sale of the zoo to the state under a statutory delinquency process.

Upon receiving the news, manager of the zoo, Belle Benchley, was instructed to continue upkeep of all the animals and facilities as usual until ownership had been sorted out. The end result was a better-organized and fiscally solvent zoo that, under state of California management, continued to expand its leadership role in conservation and wildlife education.

​Elliot Feuerstein is an officer of San Diego, California-based Mira Mesa Shopping Center, a marketplace designed to deliver the ultimate shopping experience. Working with Mira Mesa Shopping Center, Elliot Feuerstein works with architects and the city council to get project approvals, design, fund these projects, and complete them in first-class conditions.

The rising input costs for buildings caused by supply-side limitations have increased by 10-12 percent since 2021. The prices of essential building resources such as bricks, cement, steel, and labor have increased by over 20 percent. This increment will ripple across the construction industry, causing a significant increase in its other segments. Consequently, if building materials prices continue spiking, realtors and real estate companies will have lower profit margins, which may increase housing and real estate costs by as much as 10-15 percent.

As a result of this increase in costs, it won't be easy to produce budget-friendly housing and commercial buildings. Public buildings are some of the most costly facilities built. On average, building a standard shopping center costs about $24.9 million. The increase in building costs will make it more difficult for construction companies to build such shopping centers with profitable margins, and ultimately the consumer might suffer for it.

​A graduate of the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), Elliot Feuerstein is an accomplished real estate executive who has worked in the industry since the 1970s, having developed and overseen several shopping centers. He currently serves as an officer of Mira Mesa Shopping Center in San Diego, CA. In addition to his work, Elliot Feuerstein supports several community organizations, including A Reason to Survive (ARTS).

High schoolers (11th and 12th graders) in the South County region of San Diego are welcome to join a free art internship program through the ARTS @ Work initiative, which was established by A Reason To Survive (ARTS). ARTS @ Work engages student interns in hands-on creation of art under the stewardship and guidance of teaching artist mentors at Sweetwater High School. Experimental projects include digital fabrication, welding, woodwork, design thinking, and community art projects. The eight-week internship also introduces each student to project/client management know-how and various aspects of managing a business.

Based in San Diego, A Reason To Survive (ARTS) focuses on helping young people leverage the power of art and creative thinking to develop confidence, courage, and compassion. According to the group, creativity helps transform the community positively and paves the way for a better future.

​Residing in San Diego, Elliot Feuerstein has had a storied career in working on commercial real estate projects in the Southern California area. In the early 1970s, Elliot Feuerstein opened the Mira Mesa Nursery alongside his father which was one of the first retail businesses in the area. Along with being current acting officer of the Mira Mesa Shopping Center (managing the leases of retail partners including Best Buy, In-N-Out Burger, and US Bank), he has also served on the San Diego-based Sharp HealthCare Foundation Board of Directors.

Sharp is a not-for-profit hospital that provides a high level of patient care between its four acute-care hospitals, three affiliated medical clinics, and three specialty hospitals. In 1992, the Foundation successfully raised money to build Sharp Mary Birch Hospital for Women & Newborns, the largest freestanding medical center for women’s health in the area. It currently has 206 beds and delivers around 9,000 babies a year. In December 2018, Sharp Mary Birch hospital made the news when it delivered the smallest surviving baby in the world. Baby Saybie weighed 8.6 ounces and stayed in neonatal intensive care until she weighed a healthy five pounds.

Accomplished entrepreneur Elliot Feuerstein has over four decades of a successful career as a real estate developer in the San Diego, CA, area, where he served as an officer of the Mira Mesa Shopping Center. An esteemed member of the local community, Elliot Feuerstein received various commendations from the San Diego City Council. Among these was a special recognition for planting pockets of grass and trees around the location of the shopping center, which added to the community’s beautification goals.

Mira Mesa is one of the largest and most populated communities in San Diego. Covering some 10,500 acres. It is home to more than 80,000 residents. Its businesses are supplying tens of thousands of jobs.

Because of the steady growth of the Mira Mesa community, the City Council adopted the Mira Mesa Development Plan in 1992. The Plan serves as the city’s blueprint for the community’s growth and development. It sets the policies and proposals for housing, sustainable development, open spaces and parks, historic preservation, public facilities, and many others.

To make the Plan responsive to the community’s current conditions, the council is inviting the public to take part in the Mira Mesa Development Plan Update, an initiative where community residents and stakeholders participate in collaborative efforts by providing their input. Staff members from the city’s Planning Department are working with the Mira Mesa community to identify critical issues, questions about these issues, and opportunities for improvement.

The types of information residents and stakeholders provide for the Community Plan Update (CPU) include the following:

1. The growth direction of Mira Mesa in the next two or three decades;
2. The best way to deal with the expected growth in population and the accompanying employment requirements over that period.
3. The facilities, infrastructure, and services needed to address this growth.

​San Diego, CA resident Elliot Feuerstein has been in the real estate and retail industry since the 70s, developing and managing several shopping centers. Currently an officer of Mira Mesa Shopping Center, Elliot Feuerstein is a member of various organizations in the industry, including the International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC).
Elliot Feuerstein
ICSC seeks to promote the real estate and retail industry through value propositions, fostering the best practices and standards, a professional growth platform, and community growth through the ICSC Foundation.

As the charity arm of ICSC, the foundation undertakes various nonprofit initiatives for community advancement, such as the Talent Incubator Project. The foundation, realizing that new talent worked differently from the retail industry veterans, with changing technology such as mobile applications, working models such as flexible hours and benefits, created the project to support incoming staff members and create harmony with the existing teams.

The program provides innovative best practices in encouraging, introducing, and onboarding undergraduate students in the real estate and retail business. This provides accommodating and streamlined entry opportunities for the students while furnishing the industry with new and young talent. Also, the project allows ICSC members to access diverse talent from the community.