by Mike Sharkey
Staff Writer
When the City sat down to look at how it wanted to market Cecil Commerce Center, several things were fairly evident: there’s plenty of room for development, high-wage commercial and industrial jobs are the goal and major corporations and distributors are the targeted market.
Sounds like the perfect scenario for local commercial real estate brokers. Cecil may prove to be a financial boon for all, but the City also wants to make it clear that all broker-arranged deals will be one-sided.
“The City, and most municipalities, don’t pay brokerage fees,” said Paul Crawford, the deputy director of the Jacksonville Economic Development Commission. “We had internal discussions about this and the answer was, no. We will advertise in all the major real estate publications in the area and make sure the real estate community knows about it. There have been millions of articles written about Cecil and I guarantee you every real estate broker knows about Cecil.”
Crawford is by no means trying to discourage real estate agents from getting involved in brokering deals at the 5,000-acre commerce center on the Westside. He just wants to make it clear that in order to avoid showing any type of favoritism — or spending tax dollars on broker fees — the City has adopted a policy of not using a broker for its end of any potential deal. That, however, does not mean potential developers and businesses aren’t free to employ a broker for the sake of negotiating the deal.
“They bring their clients. There is nothing stopping them from that.” said Crawford. “But, we aren’t going to pay broker fees. We don’t pay realtor fees on buildings that we put out for RFP (request for proposal) either.”
Crawford said the City — and the Jacksonville Regional Chamber of Commerce, the City’s development partner at Cecil — hopes brokers treat Cecil the same way a residential real estate agent would treat a client: assess what they are looking for and what they want to spend and show them various properties that fill the bill.
“We are hoping or expecting the broker will do the same for their client,” he said. “They will still get their fees and they do the best for their client.”
The idea of using private real estate brokers to help negotiate commercial development at Cecil was broached to Mayor John Peyton recently by Walter Dickinson, founder of Colliers Dickinson, who suggested the use of brokers at Cecil would benefit the City for several reasons.
“Residential and commercial realtors have a wide range of contacts,” he said. “They have a network within their own system and through other local brokers. If the City used commercial real estate brokers, there would be a couple of hundred people working to promote Cecil Commerce Center at no charge.”
Dickinson said he employs 28 commercial real estate brokers in Jacksonville, all with plenty of experience marketing and selling industrial, office and retail and space. He said the commissions could be paid on a graduated basis: 6 percent for deals worth less than $1 million; 4 percent on anything between $1 million and $3 million; and 3 percent on anything over $3 million.
Dickinson stressed his idea is simply something for Peyton to consider.
“He is a wonderful mayor and he is doing a great job,” said Dickinson, adding selling commercial developments can be easier than residential in some respects. “Industrial and office requires less municipal services than residential. Commercial development pays a lot in taxes, but requires fewer services from the City.”
Crawford said the City and the Chamber are looking for large-scale developments for Cecil. He pointed at the recent Boeing and Bridgestone deals as examples of major manufacturers establishing a presence at the former Naval Air Station.
“We are looking for groups that have large capital investment,” said Crawford. “Typically, an end-user will not come to Cecil, it will be through its development partner. Cecil is different. It’s a large tract of land and you won’t find many other places in Jacksonville with that unique infrastructure — runways, aviation, connection to interstates. The users should be significant users and we want to make sure we are not inhibited by bringing small, lower capital projects.”