A bill for an Ordinance authorizing and approving an amendment to the Welton Corridor Urban Redevelopment Plan to add the 2801 Welton Street Project and to Create the 2801 Welton Street Property Tax Increment Area and the 2801 Welton Street Sales Tax Increment Area (FINANCE & SERVICES) Approves an amendment to the Welton Corridor Urban Redevelopment Plan for the 2801 Welton Street Project in Council District 8. The Committee approved filing this bill at its meeting on 12-16-14.
Councilman Ortega, will you please put 1103 on the floor for final consideration and do pass? Mr. President, I move the Council Bill 1103 of 2014 be placed on final consideration and do pass. It has been moved in second seconded public hearing on 1103 is now open. May we have the staff report? Me again. Mr. President, members of council, you are going to hear me repeat, much of which you just heard me say, because this is an amendment to the same urban redevelopment area and state statute requires that there be a public hearing on each amendment. So bear with me as you going to say, gosh, didn't I just hear that? And the answer will be, yes, you did just hear that. But I'm obliged to go through it again, and I will try to do it as quickly as possible. So the Walton Corridor Urban Redevelopment Plan was approved by council in September of 2012. In doing so, you found that the Urban Redevelopment Plan was in conformance with the Denver Comprehensive Plan 20 and its applicable supplements. While the Urban Redevelopment Plan authorizes the use of tax increment financing, TIF cannot be used until it is specifically approved for a project. Therefore, Debra is here this evening requesting City Council's consideration of an amendment to the Walton Corridor Urban Redevelopment Plan to add the 2801 Walton Street Project and create the 2801 Welton Street Property Tax Increment Area and sales tax increment area. The Urban Redevelopment area was established to encourage redevelopment along the Welland corridor. The Urban Redevelopment area is comprised of approximately 29 blocks, generally and approximately bounded by Broadway Street on the West Glenarm Place and 24th Avenue on the South Downing Street on the east and on the north by either California street or the alley between Welton and California streets. At the time the plan was originally approved, no projects were identified. However, the plan allowed for future projects to request tax, income and assistance and contemplated tax increment areas would be approved as projects were brought forward within the area to date. Following the outcome of the last public hearing, two projects have now been approved. The Affordable Housing Development at 2300 Welton and the mixed use predominantly residential project at 2460 Welton. The project, being considered through an amendment to the Urban Redevelopment Plan in this public hearing is the redevelopment of the site located at 2460 Welton Street. The project site, which includes a 5000 square foot vacant structure, is located at the northwest corner of 28th Street and Welton Street. The building was built in 1895 and has had a variety of uses over the years, including a tavern, a hotel and an apartment complex. The building is credited with being instrumental in the Five Points jazz scene as it once served as home to Rice's tap taphouse and played host to musicians. The last tenant of the building occupied the first floor until 2011. Thereafter, a nonprofit was allowed to use a portion of the first floor until the use was suspended due to code violations. This is not the first floor. This is the second floor. The proposed project will renovate the entire building and bring its history and heritage back to life. The renovation calls for demolishing the interior of the building, stabilizing the existing structure, exposing the brick which has been plastered over adding windows which have been removed or hidden over the years, and with it modern standards. It is intended that the first floor, totaling approximately 2500 square feet, will be occupied by a destination restaurant. The second floor, again, approximately 2500 square feet, will be marketed as unique office space. The Urban Redevelopment Plan authorizes TURA to finance projects within the urban redevelopment area by the use of tax increment financing. The Urban Redevelopment Plan Amendment will add the 2801 Welton Street Property Tax Increment Area and sales tax increment area during staff has reviewed the budgets and performance submitted by the developer and believes there is a financing gap in the project of $350,000. This financing gap will be addressed through property tax and sales tax increment generated by the redevelopment of the property. The site is currently owned by the developer who is paying approximately $5,200 per year in property taxes. This amount will constitute the base taxes from which property tax increment will be calculated. Given that the building is vacant, there is no sales tax currently being generated. Upon completion, the project is projected to generate approximately $50,000 per year in net property and sales tax increment area. These incremental tax revenues will be used to reimburse the developer for eligible expenses of $350,000 over 25 years. As noted previously, City Council found the Urban Redevelopment Plan to be in conformance with the Denver comp plan 2000 and its applicable supplements. Accordingly, any amendment to the Urban Redevelopment Plan must also be in conformance with the Urban Redevelopment Plan objectives to maintain the continuing conformance with comp plan 2000. The general objectives of the Western Corridor Urban Redevelopment Plan are to reduce or eliminate blighted conditions and to stimulate the continued growth and development of the urban redevelopment area. The proposed project meets the following objectives of the Whelton Corridor Urban Redevelopment Plan to eliminate the present and growing factors which contribute to the blight in the urban redevelopment area. To renew and improve the character and environment of the urban redevelopment area and its surroundings by preventing or ameliorating economic, physical and environmental deterioration. To encourage residential retail and commercial development and redevelopment that is socially and economically inclusive and from which the urban redevelopment area can draw economic strength to encourage land use patterns within the urban redevelopment area, which will reduce dependance upon private automobiles for transportation, to encourage land use patterns within the urban redevelopment area that result in a more environmentally sustainable city. To encourage the participation of existing property owners within the urban redevelopment area in the redevelopment of their property, encourage the re-use of existing buildings where appropriate, including historic preservation and adaptive reuse, and to promote a diverse, sustainable neighborhood economy, including mixed use and commercial development opportunities along the redevelopment area. Again, there are another a number of findings that city council must find in making this urban redevelopment plan amendment. Those include a finding that the 2801 Welton Street Project is located within the 29 BLOCK Welton Corridor Urban Redevelopment Area, and will promote the objectives set forth in the Welton Corridor Urban Redevelopment Plan that a feasible method exists for the relocation of displaced individuals and families and business concerns. The project area contains no residences. Therefore no individuals or families will be displaced. Additionally, due to the vacancy of the building, no business concerns will be displaced by the project. That written notice of this public hearing has been provided to all property owners, residents and owners of business concerns in the resolution setting this public hearing. City Council requested Dura to undertake this task. Written notice was mailed first class mail to all known property owners, residents and owners of business concerns in the Welton Corridor, Urban Redevelopment Area . On December 5th, 2014, which is at least 30 days prior to this public hearing. The statute requires that no more than 120 days have passed since the first public hearing before City Council on the Plan Amendment. Tonight is the first public hearing before Council on this Urban Redevelopment Plan Amendment. The statute also requires that two years must elapse before council can consider an urban redevelopment plan amendment if they previously failed to approve an urban redevelopment plan amendment for this project. This is the first consideration by City Council of an Urban Redevelopment Plan amendment for this project. Also, the plan amendment contains no property that was included in a previously submitted urban redevelopment plan amendment that was not approved by the City Council. As such, the requirement to wait at least 24 months since any prior public hearing is inapplicable. Conformance with the Denver Comprehensive Plan. On December 3rd, 2014, the Denver Planning Board unanimously found that the proposed amendment to the Welton Corridor Urban Redevelopment Plan conforms to the Denver Comprehensive Plan and applicable supplements. A letter to this effect has been submitted as part of the record of this hearing, and during request the Council find and concur with that finding. A planning board in the Welton Corridor, Urban Redevelopment Plan, as amended by the proposed amendment, will afford maximum opportunity consistent with the sound needs of Denver as a whole for the rehabilitation or redevelopment of the Welton Corridor. Urban Redevelopment Area by Private Enterprise SMP 2801 Welton LLC, a subsidiary of Star Mesa Properties LLC, is the owner and a private development entity who intends to undertake the redevelopment project. This amendment to the Walton Corridor Urban Redevelopment Plan contains provisions for property tax increment financing. Accordingly, Denver Public Schools District Number one has been permitted to participate in an advisory capacity with respect to the inclusion in the plan of the tax allocation provisions authorized by Section 31 does 25, DASH 107 and nine of the Colorado Urban Renewal Law. Finally, the city and county of Denver can adequately finance and agreements are in place to finance any additional city and county of Denver infrastructure and services required to serve development within the 2801 Welton Street Urban Redevelopment Project area for the period during which the incremental property taxes are paid to the authority. The plan allows for cooperative agreements between the city and Doura to address additional infrastructure requirements and city services should they arise. Again, we're very pleased to be working with the city. And with the Five Points Business District and with the developer in bringing this project forward. The redevelopment of this site and the adaptive reuse of a 100 plus year old building into mixed use space, including restaurant and office space, is wholly consistent with the redevelopment vision of the Welton Street corridor, a corridor that has seen limited development activity in many years. Its proximity to and presence along an existing transit corridor captures many city wide goals, objectives and strategies that are found in the comp plan. The Northeast Downtown Neighborhoods Plan and the Wilton Corridor Urban Redevelopment Plan. This project, particularly taken in connection with the two other residential projects along the corridor, begins to put together the pieces necessary for a vibrant community. We ask for your favorable consideration of this amendment, and I'll be happy to answer any questions you may have. Thank you, Ms.. Higgins. We have two speakers for this one. Traci Winchester You may come on up and begin your remarks, followed by Mr. Sekou. Thank you, Mr. President, and members of the City Council. My name is Tracy Winchester. I reside at 217 South Jackson Street, but I am the executive director of the Five Points Business District. At 2444 Washington Street and had been the executive director since 2011. As I mentioned in the previous project that we did put together a revitalization study that was funded by HUD, and we had six urban planners that developed the strategy that came out in 2013, August of 2013. And one of the guiding principles in that plan was preserving our historic cultural district, that it is a valuable asset for the neighborhood, and that to keep history and culture visible within the district by balancing the preservation of the district culture with new development. I can't tell you how happy we are about this development. This beloved building resonates in this community. I mean, really? BJ's Port authorizes hotel pub. I mean, it has had so many names and so many iterations over the years and the history is still alive and well and everyone is excited about this developer Stamas coming in and preserving this property. What is interesting, although it is in the cultural district, the historic cultural district, it is not a contributing building. As you know, a contributing building means it cannot be torn down. Well, even though they had the option, it was never even put out there for consideration. Their whole intent was to preserve the history of this building. And so we couldn't be any happier than to have this developer come in and redevelop this building and bring it back to its life and the history that it has enjoyed over 100 years. So without much ado, I just give full support and I encourage you all to please support this historic district, this historic building within our urban renewal district, because, again, it's part of the bigger vision, the wider vision to have new development, as well as preserving our history and our culture here on the Welty Street corridor. Thank you again. Thank you. Miss Winchester. It's your second. There was a song that was popular the 1980s called Another One Bites the Dust. Slowly but surely, the buildings are being preserved. And they're going to be nice and pretty interesting and the bricks are going to be blasted. But now who now owns the building? I think the ownership has changed culturally from black to white, and then there's going to be a restaurant in there or proposed. Now, one of the criticisms of this plan that we had with this thing that everybody's up on board for was there was a overabundance of barbershops and beauty shops and under-development down here on the Five Points. And now we got an overlay of nothing but restaurants and bars come. There's no mix in economic development going down here. So you tell me where in the plant that's at. And then we have these organizations in our neighborhood. And it's no criticism of Tracy because she don't live in a neighborhood. She lives in Cherry Creek making policy decisions for our neighborhood that she don't even live in or have any historical relationship to the building or the neighborhood. So what outpost is she working for? Because most of these developers are coming from outside our neighborhood. So we're at the black economic development for the black community happening in the black community. Hmm. Thank you. Yeah, it's crying. It makes me want to sneeze, too, because when it's all said and done. You have a phasing out of a culture and now you're getting ready to turn black folks into museum relics where this is the building they used to be in. And this is a neighborhood that used to be kind of like Arapaho Forest, but this is where the Indians used to be. But then they're eaten and left. And there's something very dehumanizing about that. There's something very criminal about that. I think there's a United Nations law against ethnic cleansing and gentrification. It's called genocide. Removing populations with pencil and pen and government audiences. And then folks go to jail for that. I think the guy in Yugoslavia went to jail for that. What he did to Croatia. But you're missing the prosecution because you haven't been brought on the carpet for the work that you're doing. And it's okay because you're going to vote unanimously for this, too. Mr. Speaker, your 3 minutes are up. Thank you. And thank you for you. Thank you for your time. You. We do appreciate that as well. That is all the speakers. Time for questions of members of council. Councilman Brooks. Yeah. Just two questions. Tracy Huggins. You don't need to bring all that up there. I just I just I think I missed the year that this building was developed in 1895. Wow. Okay. Thank you. That's it. And then I'm going to invite, if you don't mind, Mr. President, Kelly Slater up here from Star Mesa. And I just have a couple questions for you on. Can you just give us an idea of, you know, the restaurant type? I mean, maybe you can't see everything. And then when do you guys plan to start redevelopment? Yeah. So I'm Kelly Slater from Star based Properties. Thank you for. Being here today. So we're really excited. About a restaurant. Going in maybe two ways. We haven't exactly picked out a restaurant tenant, but we think it would be perfect for a destination type. Idea with the light rail being in there and. It's proximity to downtown, it's actually only a about a ten block walk from the central business district. So it could be a nice place for people to go after work. So we are exploring. A lot of options for different tenants. Right. And in the time that you guys are thinking about oh yes. We are hoping to start construction in March or April. Okay, great. Thank you. Thank you, Councilman. Councilman Ortega. Tracy Higgins, can you clarify if the tool of that Dora has the authority to use of eminent domain has been used at all in this in any of the in this particular project or the last one that we just talked about? No, it has not. In fact, we are not authorized under the urban redevelopment plan to use eminent domain. We would have to come back to council to get that. But it is not been used on any of the three projects that. We have brought. Forward for council. So any of the current ownership or previous ownership were willing sellers to who the existing developers may be on these projects? Yes, they have all been brought to us as as that transaction has already occurred between the purchaser in the seller. I just want to clarify that. Thank you. Thank you, Councilwoman Ortega. And the questions on 11 03c non public hearing, 1103 is closed time for comments. Councilman Brooks. Thank you, Mr. President. And actually, I want to thank Councilwoman Ortega for for bringing that up. This property was owned by Charlie Cousins. And since, you know, Charlie Cousins was a huge business owner in the area and has since passed and was owned by his daughter, Dr. René Cousins, and they own quite a bit of property on Walton. And you know, as someone who is has been down there for years, they actually want to see development get going and some of their properties, they thought that it would be advantageous for them to sell. So this was all kind of willing participants. But again, this is the third project of our urban renewal area. And, you know, I keep I keep bringing this up. We we. Passed. The formation of the area in September 2012. Here we are in January 2015. And there are projects that are going through there. And and let me just let the public know and let let the folks up here know something that doesn't get advertised enough. But I think in the five points area we get criticized a lot for is the indigenous ownership. What is the percentage of indigenous ownership that's on Walton? Has anybody answered that question? Well, it's 55%. And I heard in a meeting the other day that it was 10% ownership in the area. And it is pretty spectacular seeing that there is indigenous ownership for 50 years who are still redeveloping their properties, revisioning their properties because they're working with the five points, the business district with Tracy Winchester, who is going door to door, working with folks, making sure that they get every tool available to them by the city of Denver . And so I just want to make that clear, but we're very excited for Kelly and her team coming in and giving us another use some more office space and something that doesn't get talked about a lot using tax increment financing dollars for the preservation of a building that they didn't need to preserve. But I can tell you right now, there are residents all over this area that if you to torn it down, there have been another 300 emails for me and, you know, all this other stuff. But thank you for having a very. Vision for the area saying we want to have adaptive reuse. We would love to rethink kind of this building and this this whole area. So we look forward to to the restaurant. I know you say that there's some other space that potentially could be used for something else. Have I ever mentioned this grocery store idea? On what? It could be amazing. Fresh produce. It's tough to get a salad on Welton. And so this could be a great opportunity. I'm just saying. But thank you so much for your investment and where we are. We're excited about the future and council and folks in the public. You will not see every development come up front in front of council, but there 6 to 7 more redevelopment opportunities that we're really excited about coming up in the next eight months. Traces, traces and I's favorite word is $200 million of redevelopment is coming on Welton in 2015, which is extraordinary and it's because of all of the partners. OED Urban Renewal, Denver Urban Renewal Authority, the city, everyone has just been great. And so I want to thank my colleagues as well and I hope you'll support this. Thank you, Councilman Brooks. Councilwoman Robb. I just wanted to add an exclamation point to the historic preservation side of this, to everyone involved from Duryea to Tracy Winchester to Councilman Brooks, and particularly the property owners. That vision for what the building is going to look like is pretty exciting and a real treasure. Thank you, Councilman. Um, Councilwoman Chabot. Oh, thank you. I just wanted to clarify with Councilman Brooks what he means by indigenous ownership. Usually when the word indigenous is used, I think of it as native peoples. So I just want to be clear that I understand what you mean when you say that. Yeah. So indigenous to this street in this neighborhood would be African-Americans and Latino individuals who actually own the property in this neighborhood. So that's it's exciting, exciting news for us as we went in and actually went by from and we're talking about let me clarify this. We're talking from 23rd and Welton all the way to Downey. And so it's it's very exciting. I think. All right. Any other comments on 11 03c None. Madam Secretary, Rocco Brooks. I. Can each layman. Lopez Monteiro. Hi, Nevitt. Hi, Ortega. Rob. Hi, Shepherd. Hi, Mr. President. Hi. Madam Secretary, please close the voting and ask the results tonight. Tonight's 1103 has been placed upon final consideration and does pass now. Council. We're going to vote on the companion bill 1104. Councilman Ortega, could you please put 1104 to be placed on final consideration and do pass I. Move that council bill 1104 series of 24 be adopted on final. Yeah you said 2004 I make sure it correct corrected 2014. I'm sorry I didn't mean 2014. All right. It's been moved in second and seen no comments. Madam Secretary, roll call. Brooks. Yes, I sorry. Can each layman. Lopez Montero, Nevett I Ortega, I Rob I Shepherd. Mr. President. Hi. Madam Secretary. Please close the door. You announce the results tonight. Tonight's 1104 has been placed upon final consideration and does pass. All right, we are halfway there. We're now moving on to Council Bill 1071. Councilman Ortega, will you please put Council Bill 1071 on the floor?