Latest news with #SauraJost
Yahoo
15-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
St. Paul: At Highland Bridge, Weidner Homes, Ryan Cos. win concessions
Eager to jumpstart 450 residential units and a series of commercial buildings on long-stalled development parcels at Highland Bridge, the St. Paul City Council voted 5-2 on Wednesday to amend a longstanding tax incentive district, delaying construction of some internal sidewalks and landscaping for up to five years. The amendments — the sixth to the former Ford Motor Co. site's $275 million tax increment financing district since 2016 — do not alter the total spending planned within the TIF district, but they do alter payment schedules. A new 'minimum assessments agreement' shifts some TIF payments from interest to principal and saves the master developer, the Ryan Cos., some costs upfront as the taxable value of particular land parcels are lowered. 'This does not impact the city budget or the general fund,' said Council Member Saura Jost, addressing the city council on Wednesday. 'This reduces the holding cost to the developer, enabling it to move forward as foreseen in the master plan. … We're not changing the public investment at the site.' Getting county assessors to agree to drop land values took a joint effort from both the city and the Ryan Cos. At Highland Bridge, Weidner Apartment Homes now plan construction of two market-rate apartment buildings spanning 350 housing units in the near future. Nearby, the Ryan Cos. had once planned to have started work on a series of commercial or mixed-use buildings on the parcel known as 'Block 2' back in 2021. Neither project has moved forward in recent years, with both developers blaming the city's rent control policies for adding to an already-complicated financing landscape weighed down by high interest rates, rising construction costs and other barriers. The Ryan Cos. have since redrawn their plans for four one-story commercial buildings, as well as a four-story, mixed-use residential building consisting of 97 market-rate rental units attached to ground-floor commercial space, a rooftop deck, streetscape improvements and a public promenade. Also planned is a 190-stall structured parking facility. 'You would see immediate development at this site,' said Maureen Michalski, a regional senior vice president of development with the Ryan Cos., referring to the TIF agreement. So far, the developer has secured a letter of intent for a daycare to operate in one of the stand-alone commercial buildings. Both Council Members HwaJeong Kim and Nelsie Yang voted against the new TIF arrangement and the related agreements. While 20% of Highland Bridge is set up for affordable housing through a master plan, Yang expressed concern Wednesday that there was little clarity about the specific rents planned in the new residential buildings. The overall number of residential units planned for Highland Bridge has been redrawn at 3,100 units, down from an initial projection of 3,800 units, according to city staff. Rents at an existing market-rate development — The Collection at Highland Bridge — average about $2,000 per unit, according to a spokesperson for Weidner Apartment Homes, who said he expected the new construction to proceed along the same grounds. 'Is this truly the biggest win that we can get for the city of St. Paul at the negotiation table?' said Yang, noting that Ramsey County had delayed a vote this week on the new minimum assessments agreement. 'I don't know what an alternative agreement could have looked like. … Also, where is the county on this, too? This is something that is going to be impacting them.' With Weidner refusing to move forward until the company was released from rent control obligations, the city council voted 4-3 last week to relieve all buildings citywide built after 2004 from the city's voter-approved 3% cap on annual rent increases. Council Member Cheniqua Johnson, who chairs the city's Housing and Redevelopment Authority, said Wednesday she was excited to see new housing move forward, though she was disappointed with Weidner's lack of communication with her office, as well as with the city in general, prior to the council vote on the rent control amendment. 'I want to add you to that discussion,' said Johnson, addressing Weidner development director Nick Nowotarski, who promised better days ahead. 'That was the first time I had ever met you.' Added Council President Rebecca Noecker, 'I have been on this council for 10 years, and I've never had any contact with Weidner. … It matters to have you show up, and it matters to have this communication.' The Ryan Cos. now hope to build the stand-alone commercial structures and the mixed-use building on Blocks 2 using both a public business subsidy and some $24 million in additional loan principal, supported by tax increment financing through a pay-as-you-go note. 'TIF' tax incentives allow private developers to complete public-facing aspects of their developments using money that would ordinarily pay off city, county and school district tax obligations. The city's Housing and Redevelopment Authority hired the tax firm Baker Tilly as a fiscal consultant to evaluate project costs, financing and operations and confirm the need for TIF to move the Ryan Cos.' Block 2 project forward. A fresh agreement involves lower new tax values for the buildable land. The original 'minimum assessments agreement … places a tax burden on the properties without an offsetting income source,' reads the city staff report. 'Both the city and the developer have incurred debt to advance the infrastructure and have carefully evaluated adjustments to the minimum values to entice the stalled development to proceed.' 'We have worked with the assessor, who is supportive of adjustments to certain lots,' the report states. 'The resulting … amendment will reduce values for the certain lots in the short term.' The lot values will exceed the original values in 2041 and continue to increase through the year 2047, the final year of the TIF district. Separately, the Weidner agreement will require the construction of two buildings resulting in approximately 350 housing units over the next few years, as well as pre-payment to the city of all of their 'Green Infrastructure' assessments. Jost noted that form of binding development agreement was not in place previously. The two developers have agreed not to apply for additional city or Housing and Redevelopment Authority funds on land they own for any future 'vertical development' at Highland Bridge. 'Highland Bridge is important to Ward 3,' Jost told the council Wednesday. 'It's important to the whole city. … Our city will see one of its vacant spaces replaced with something of purpose. … We're expanding the housing options available to our residents in Highland.'
Yahoo
14-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
St. Paul City Council advocates for a Green New Deal
Spurred on by students from Macalester College and other young people, the St. Paul City Council on Wednesday voted 6-0 to call on Congress to enact a 'Green New Deal.' The resolution, authored with the help of the Sunrise Movement Twin Cities — the Macalester-based chapter of a national youth-led environmental movement — was sponsored by council members Saura Jost, HwaJeong Kim and Nelsie Yang. Progressive politicians from U.S. Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., to Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein have called without success for a raft of federal environmental policies aimed at simultaneously combatting economic inequality and rising global temperatures. St. Paul in 2019 adopted a 'Climate Action and Resiliency Plan' with the stated goals of carbon neutrality in city operations by 2030, a 50% reduction in citywide carbon emissions by 2030 and citywide carbon neutrality by 2050. The resolution calls for the city to align its policies — including the 2050 Comprehensive Plan and a renewal of the existing Climate Action plan — with the values of a Green New Deal, in part by allocating future proceeds from utility-related franchise fees toward 'making St. Paul a more climate-resilient city.' The resolution also calls for the city clerk to send copies of the resolution to U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar, U.S. Sen. Tina Smith, and U.S. Rep. Betty McCollum. Politics | Downtown St. Paul's historic Commerce Building sold, but apartments will retain 'affordable' designation Politics | St. Paul City Council to hear appeal of FCC Environmental trash truck site on March 19 Politics | Contest for St. Paul City Council's Ward 4 seat draws Cole Hanson, Molly Coleman, Cristen Incitti Politics | St. Paul: Tree preservation ordinance on hold for 6 months Politics | Letters: 'It doesn't cost anything to be nice to someone'
Yahoo
20-02-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
St. Paul City Council deadlocks around Ryan Cos. plan to add one-story buildings along Ford Parkway
A developer's efforts to add a series of single-story buildings along the outer edges of the Highland Bridge development have been rebuffed by a tie vote of the St. Paul City Council. The Ryan Cos. recently sought zoning variances to add four squat buildings along Ford Parkway, each of them no more than 12 to 18 feet tall, on parcels of land where city zoning calls for a minimum of 40 feet. Variance requests for building height and floor area ratio were denied in January by the city's Board of Zoning Appeals after some members likened the proposal to a strip mall, thrusting the issue before the city council. Council Member Saura Jost, who represents Highland Park, urged her fellow council members on Wednesday to vote in favor of the Ryan Cos. two appeals of the BZA decision, noting that 'almost all projects at Highland Bridge have approved variances from the zoning code.' The council then voted on Jost's motions, deadlocking 3-3 on each of the company's requests for zoning variances on the two land parcels. Council Members Anika Bowie and Cheniqua Johnson joined Jost in voting yes, and Council President Rebecca Noecker and HwaJeong Kim joined Nelsie Yang in voting no. Given the tie, the motions did not pass. Council members noted that the vote could be reconsidered next week if a council member changed their vote. Spanning more than 122 acres, the former home of the Ford Motor Company assembly plant in Highland Park has been developed into hundreds of housing units, commercial offices, multiple playgrounds and a Lunds & Byerlys grocery store, but residential construction has slowed. Representatives of the Ryan Cos. have expressed concern that filling an additional series of sizable commercial or mixed-use buildings will be difficult given an economic climate marked by high interest rates, a difficult lending environment, sluggish city population growth, remote work and the city's rent control ordinance. Just prior to the vote, Jost said the Board of Zoning Appeals had erred in identifying Ford Parkway at Cretin Avenue as a 'neighborhood node,' or a potential transit and development hotspot, when it's not listed as such in the city's Comprehensive Plan. She also noted the Ryan Cos. had expressed concern about navigating Ford Parkway's steep slope, shallow bedrock and perched water, as well as pedestrian easements that cut across the lot diagonally, which had been a city priority. 'Buildings ultimately bear on the soil below them,' Jost said. 'These are challenges not created by the landowner, but by the land. And as I mentioned before, they impact the entirety of the design.' A Twin Cities developer unimpressed with the concept plans told the BZA — and the city council, during a public hearing last week — that construction challenges around slopes and bedrock are common and not insurmountable. While the Ryan Cos. had not provided a geo-technical analysis to prove their point, neither had he, Jost noted. 'I strongly disagree with a local developer being an expert when it comes to sub-surface soil conditions,' she said. 'They're not expert design professionals.' Taking the opposite tack, Yang said the BZA had relied on credible testimony from a developer with experience in the field, and she could not support the company's appeals. 'I did not find an error in the decision-making,' she said. Local News | Ryan Cos. appeals denial of Highland Bridge one-story storefronts Local News | Ryan Cos. to appeal negative zoning decision at St. Paul's Highland Bridge Local News | St. Paul Board of Zoning Appeals blocks Highland Bridge 'strip mall' proposal 4-2 Local News | St. Paul: At Highland Bridge, Ryan Cos. seeks less height, density along Ford Parkway Local News | St. Paul free mental health clinic reached more than 100 visits since opening in October
