Development May Get Reboot

By Danielle Corcoran
Wisconsin State Journal, March 3, 2006

Ald. Brenda Konkel said Thursday she will try to rescue an $84 million housing and retail project that many saw as critical to revitalizing Madison's near East Side.

Following two years of planning, the project appeared dead Monday after the city's financial committee, the Board of Estimates, reached an impasse over tax incremental financing (TIF).

The city has offered developer Gary Gorman $2.2 million in TIF funds for the first phase of the project, but the BOE refused to loan his company an additional $2 million to help with land costs for the second phase without a guarantee that the loan would be repaid.

Gorman said he couldn't guarantee repaying the loan before the city pledged TIF support to help him complete the second phase.

Plans for the full project were praised by the neighborhood and the city alike. The project would involve building 309 condos in nine buildings, as well as retail space and parking stalls, on the 800 block of East Washington Avenue.

"Everyone thinks it's a good project," Konkel said. "It would seem like such a shame to lose it at this point."

Konkel said she will introduce a resolution to the City Council on Tuesday asking the city to come up with a creative financing package for the $2 million that "may or may not be a loan."

Gorman said he is open to exploring solutions, but he also thinks this is "one of those situations where there really isn't a need for a fix."

The first phase of the project, he said, would generate more than $2 million for the city even if the second phase never happened.

Mayoral spokesman George Twigg said the big question remains how much public assistance is appropriate.

"We're willing to hear out any new proposals that come forward, but we don't want to raise expectations that there's a silver bullet out there that will resolve this," Twigg said.