Elks Building Project - What Will We See?
The News Tribune had an update on the Elks Building project that should interest at least a few of you. What’s happening? When will we see something? Well, it depends.
According to the story, the fine folks at McMenamins, who now own the Elks building itself, will be opening their doors to us in the Spring of 2013. It gets a bit more complicated when we look at the north side of the lot. The City purchased the lot as part of a complicated sales agreement that launched this latest chapter for the Elks building. The City has agreed to build a parking garage in conjunction with a mixed use building proposed by developers Rick Moses and Grace Pleasants. That building would contain retail and apartments. At one point the plans included the hotel units for the adjoining McMenamins Elks project.
For two years, during the worst recession in decades, the pair has tried to pull together a financing package that includes two loans, tax credits and federal mortgage insurance to build a retail-apartment-hotel building on top of a city-owned garage. The new building would complement and supplement activity at the renovated temple. The city would build the parking garage only if the developers could find financing for their part and buy the land.
The land-purchase deadline was Sept. 23, and it passed without action. McMenamins now has decided to put its hotel rooms in its own building, effectively divorcing the projects, and Moses and Pleasants have been negotiating with the city.
The developers are in default to the city and have until the end of the month to negotiate a new plan. Now we wait and see …
Read more: http://www.thenewstribune.com/2011/11/10/1899846/apartment-project-in-limbo.html
Link to The News Tribune
Previously on Exit133: Elks Building Plans Continue to Shift
Filed under: McMenamins Elks Project
3 comments
J Jesse November 11, 2011
If Pleasants and Moses don’t pull through, this is what I’d like to see:
1. The parking lot south of the Elks built to broadway street level – parking plus you could get someone to build ontop of it to add more shops to Broadway.
2. Keep the lot north of theElks as empty. Pleasants and Moses will eventually be able to build on it—if ever this economy turns around.
3. Stay on track for the Elks re-do and help McMenamins buy the Old City Hall so they can put their hotel in it.
T talus November 15, 2011
I hope the McMenamins folks are reading Jesse’s suggestions — Putting a hotel in OCH actually seems like it might be feasible!
J Jesse November 15, 2011
I wrote and then called McMenamins about it. They said they have a lot on their plate and they are committed to the Grace Pleasants / Rick Moses project and didn’t say much else. I told them about the dire situation OCH is in and they could probably get it for super cheap right now AND it’s completely empty.