RM 11-16-79 - Laserfiche WebLink

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South Bend Redevelopment Commission Regular Meeting T November 16, 1979 7. PROGRESS REPORTS a. Mr. Ellison continues... with whatever they intend to do. With respect to the four proposals, we think three warran- ted great consideration. The one proposal regarding the conversion of the building to housing, we decided very early on, should.not warrant further consideration because the proposal is too problematic. There are too many con- ditions associated with it. If FHA insurance is available, if an approval can be received in 60 days, and on, and on. We also felt that their proposal gave no market data and did not demonstrate that there exists within South Bend a capacity to rent residential space in the Odd Fellows Building at, the rents indicated.. Finally and most signifi- cantly, we felt that the proposal would require a change in the Urban.Renewal Plan.which we think would compete with publicly acknowledged plans for the East Bank, which call for a substantial rehab residential emphasis. We also felt that the developer's proposition under which the Commission or the City would be asked to provide approximately 50 parking spaces on a lease basis inside a public garage facility to be built is unrealistic since the City does not offer parking on a 24 hour a day basis. So because of the parking, because of the need to change the Urban Renewal Plan and the conditions associated with that proposal, the staff, at least in its consideration, eliminated it very early on as simply being not suitable. With respect to the other three proposals, we have had what I would describe as limited conversation with the prospec- tive developers. We were not concerned so much about trying to ask a million questions to get some absolute assurance that the proposal could work financially, because in the first place none of them appeared to work financially. The all appeared to need some additional work before a lender would buy into them. We did that intentionally so as to avoid being in a position, if you will, of negotiating with prospective developers while they are competing with one another. That may or may not have been a wise thing to do, but we felt it appropriate particularly when we began to realize more and more certain significant things. One signi- ficant thing is that, the Odd Fellows Building as an office facility, apparently was not going to survive without public sector intervention. The first public action was to acquire the building and to relocate its tenants. Our analysis seems to reveal that that had a positive effect on older office space in and around downtown South Bend. Further we note that even though we spent some $288,000 to acquire the building, and approximately another $50,000 to relocate the tenants, that even if we were to sell the building to -17-