by Michele Newbern Gillis
Staff Writer
Two projects to develop the Brooklyn area of Jacksonville include a plan to go vertical by the end of the year and change the face of what has been a blighted area for more than 40 years.
The Commercial Real Estate Women of Jacksonville brought in the leaders of the two projects to discuss where they are with the development of the projects, which will be along Riverside Avenue just west of the city’s downtown.
Two of the panelists were Jason Perry, vice president of development of Miles Development Partners and developer of Brooklyn Park; and Coen Purvis, senior vice president of Hallmark Partners and developer of 200 Riverside.
The panel was rounded out by Ron Barton, executive director of the Jacksonville Economic Development Commission.
David Scheele, vice president of operations of Elkins Constructors, the contractor on the Brooklyn projects, was the moderator.
“It’s an exciting project and it’s a long time coming,” said Scheele.
Perry discussed his company is developing.
“We have a total of 550 residential units, 50,000 square feet of retail, 250 hotel rooms and a park planned,” said Perry. “Our project is not on hold. We hope to break ground by the end of the year on Phase I of 281 apartment units. We did receive a workforce housing incentive worth up to $3 million over a 10-year period. Our infrastructure budget is around $9 million and it is funded by the City.”
Phase II of Brooklyn Park will include condominiums, office space, a hotel, retail, restaurants and a park.
Jacksonville-based Hallmark Partners has planned a two-phase development called 200 Riverside Avenue.
The first phase will have 148,545 square feet of office, retail and parking. The office space will house the new headquarters for the Marks Gray law firm and Elkins Constructors. A hotel and 250 residential units are planned for Phase II.
Both projects are in the procurement process to select contractors to do the infrastructure, so a definitive groundbreaking date is not set.
Barton was asked why the City thought this was a good project.
He referred back to his first job out of college back in 1978 when he worked for the City’s planning board.
“One of the first projects I worked on was the Brooklyn Neighborhood Plan,” he said. “Brooklyn is the area just off of Riverside that is bounded by the Interstate, McCoy Creek, St. Johns River, the CSX rail line and Fuller Warren Bridge. It has been in a blighted condition for well over 40 years. It was on the Downtown Development Authority’s radar in 1978 and when I got back (to the JEDC) two years ago it was still a blighted community. It’s ironic because it is such a great area in our downtown. It has such great potential and it presented such a great opportunity.”
Because of its confined nature, he said, the area would be easier to manage, control and plan for.
“It’s not as dynamic as the entire downtown so, to the City, it always struck us that it was a confined area that over time we could manage and that actually the market could respond to as well,” said Barton.
Both developers discussed how it took them a bit of time to assemble the parcels of land needed to house the large development they were looking at building.
“It took us two and a half years to assemble all of the land we needed,” said Perry.
Purvis said he and his co-workers saw the development along Riverside Avenue and wanted to be a part of it. The riverfront area includes major companies such as St. Joe, Fidelity National Financial, The Florida Times-Union and EverBank.
“There were a lot of good things there, but it really hadn’t jumped across Riverside Avenue and gone over to Brooklyn,” said Purvis. “We thought with our project in that far corner, maybe we could make that happen.”
A private/public partnership was formed.
“When we started our conversations with Miles and Hallmark, we were also in the midst of doing our downtown action plan,” said Barton. “One of those 19 initiatives that were critical to achieve the kind of downtown that we wanted was to put an additional emphasis behind workforce housing.”
In the past, incentives were used for market rate housing such as Berkman Plaza and other downtown housing projects, but times have changed.
“I think those were good decisions because, at that time, there was no proven market for residential downtown at all,” said Barton. “But, at that juncture things were really shifting our philosophy. If we are going to use incentives, we do not need to do it for market rate housing. We need workforce housing. It’s always great when we have a guinea pig. We were running down the path of the workforce housing task force, looking at how to create an incentive program, and at the same time we were in the discussions with Hallmark and Miles on their development projects.”
As a byproduct of the taskforce, they made use of the Recapture Enhanced Value (REV) Grant Program.
“At the time that the taskforce was working through the issue of how to create a program for workforce housing,” said JEDC executive Karen Nasrallah. “Miles had come to us and said we have gaps and we need your help in filling them. It was just fortuitous to us that here we have a real live developer looking for ways to make workforce housing a reality in downtown and we have a task force who is trying to put together a program to assist new developers who are coming into an urban setting to do workforce housing. The two kind of meshed. It helped the task force members understand where the developers needed help.”
They were not only able to roll the concept out and adopt the program, but are using it in the redevelopment agreement with Miles.
According to the program, the buyer or renter has to qualify for workforce housing.
“What we are requiring to qualify for a REV Grant is that 30 percent of each phase of the project meet workforce housing price points and qualified candidates,” said Nasrallah. “So, 30 percent of their apartment building has to match the rent that the Florida Finance Corporation says a workforce housing person can afford. Then they also have to qualify the people who rent those apartments. The household can’t make more than $60,300.”