Topics for this post:
- Minor items:
- Credit card bills
- Room Tax refund for Baeten Lakeshore Properties
- Public Comment for Apartments at 3000 Forest Ave.
- Contract amendment update for 2023 Washington St (UniMart)
City Council Meeting
Looks like it’ll be a pretty short council meeting on Monday, but there are a few interesting details.
Minor Items
Credit Card Bills
I noticed that while the city files a summary of verified bills that include the check register, it doesn’t also file the credit card bills… It only appears as a $50k line item labeled as a credit card payment.
I could be wrong and just missed them in previous meeting packets, but that’s a significant amount of money that might be lacking oversight. The line item in question is at the end of page 65 of the packet.
Room Tax Refund
I’ve written about the $30k refund of room tax from a December meeting. The Baetens overpaid, so the city has to refund the money. I believe tomorrow we’ll be hearing from the city lawyer about whether it can all be refunded from the room tax budget, or if it has to keep the same 70/30% split of room tax and general fund.
I’m pretty sure it’ll have to meet the 70/30 split, which would not be great since the 2025 budget was already approved before this was known. Starts on page 89 of the packet.
Public Comment for Apartments at 3000 Forest Ave.
I haven’t written about this much, as all the meetings about it have either been in Plan Commission (which isn’t televised) or Closed Session. But the old Hansen Floral property at 3000 Forest Ave. plans have been approved by the Plan Commission and are going in front of Council.
It is an $8.4M development of two 3-story buildings that make up 52 apartments. They will be market rate apartments, not subsidized affordable housing. The photo below is out of date, but if you look on pages 16-17 of the agenda packet you’ll see that the parking lot has been changed.
The developer is 2 Rivers Real Estate Development LLC. That’s Basudev Adhikari, the guy who does the BP gas stations and Spices restaurants.
While Council did go into closed session to discuss a TIF grant (basically a tax break for 10-20 years), I don’t see any votes recorded for approving a grant. It was also mentioned on the agenda for the Plan Commission meeting, but then nothing in the minutes about it. Given that it’s also not on the agenda for tomorrow, I have to assume there isn’t going to be a TIF grant.
Tomorrow is your only chance to speak up for or against this project. Starts on page 4 of the packet.
Contract Amendment Update for 2023 Washington St (UniMart)
I’ve also written about this one before, where Wine Not LLC is backing out of developing the UniMart property. The only real update here is the line items Wine Not is asking to recoup through sale of the property (along with one-third of profits exceeding that amount).
Plan design by Vision Architecture- $6,203.23
Engineering by Larson- $1,932.00
Permits- $3,912.00
Dumpster- $1,769.58
Asbestos Testing by Environmental Management- $970.00
Asbestos Removal by Advanced Asbestos Removal- $1,585.00
Demo of building by Tower Excavating- $21,900.00
Lot purchase price (from city)- $10,000
Total: $48,271.81
My Thoughts
Did the city lose out by this property not being developed?
No, probably not, as an almost identical property is available a block north.
Did the city gain anything by Wine Not owning the property the past couple years?
Yes, definitely. The building had friable asbestos and there was a tank in the ground that had to be removed. So while previously we had a site that required about $50k in cleanup, we now have a lot with a clean WDNR signoff that can be developed without further cleanup.
Is that worth the $50-60k the city is giving away with this contract amendment?
Sort of. We’re already not able to sell or develop the properties we have because the city just can’t get to it all. In a perfect world this would be a bad deal for the city. But pragmatically, we’re incentivizing Wine Not LLC to find a new developer for the property and get out of the complexities of the city owning real estate property downtown.
Connections
Here’s a new thing I’m planning to add to some posts. Where city government items include people with business, family, or leadership connections, I think it’s important to show those. Two brief points:
- I am not implying corruption or unethical behavior. And I don’t personally believe that is happening either.
- Relationship like these change how people behave for better or worse… Or at the very least a person considers it when making decisions. Anyone who claims otherwise isn’t being honest.
Meeting Agenda Packet
You can read the full packet that council members get here:
MEET-Packet-238acda4816e4464ade70c10466cdf0b.pdf
