'The Price of Renewal' examines issues of community development, philanthropy and civic engagement as a single community struggles to rebuild a tattered and declining neighborhood. This one-hour film profiles the long-term redevelopment of the once-deteriorating neighborhood of City Heights, often referred to as the Ellis Island of San Diego. Profound redevelopment plans placed the community in an unlikely partnership with businessman and philanthropist Sol Price, the founder of the Price Club who is widely recognized as the father of the discount warehouse industry, and William Jones, an African-American real estate developer who was the youngest person ever elected to the San Diego City Council. Price and Jones were able to attract significant private and public investment into a neighborhood long shunned by suburbanites. More than a dozen years of sustained work culminated in the construction of a dramatic new architectural complex that includes a public library, an elementary school, a housing complex, a major shopping center, a new theater, a public gymnasium and an adult education center. The film examines the double-edged sword that redevelopment can bring, as we witness an improbable alliance of community groups, public officials, philanthropists and business people working together to transform a community in decline. Among the issues explored in the film are: the challenges of revitalizing a diverse inner city neighborhood; the role of philanthropy in community revitalization; the contrast between the inner city and suburban areas; the challenge of measuring success in a community redevelopment project, when gentrification is also occurring.