Bloomington set to pay $1.9 million for NE part of parking lot, planned for convention center expansion
In 2019, Bloomington’s redevelopment commission (RDC) paid $4,995,000 for most of the downtown block that formerly housed the Bunger & Robertson law firm.
It was a move that put a significant sum behind the city’s preferred site for the planned expansion of the Monroe Convention Center. But it came with at least some amount of controversy for what was supposed to be a city-county collaboration.
For some of the actors involved in convention center planning at the time, it had been an open question: Should the expansion be located north or south of the existing convention center at 3rd Street and College Avenue? The city’s purchase appeared to be an attempt to settle that question.
The price tag was just under the $5-million statutory threshold that would have required the city council’s approval. And the deal still did not put the whole block under the city’s control.
The city was still negotiating with a different property owner for the remaining 0.4 acres, which consists of about 45 surface parking spaces.
Now, Bloomington’s RDC is set to buy the remaining part of the block.
On the RDC’s Monday meeting agenda is a purchase agreement for $1.9 million to buy the parcel located at 216 S. College Ave.
To buy the property, city has pursued protracted negotiations with the owners of the property, Thomas Sicks and Nancy Held.
Since the 2019 purchase of the Bunger & Robertson property, the city has been leasing the northeast corner of the parking lot from Sicks and Held. As a part of the deal, the city has also been paying the property taxes on the parcel.
For the last year and a half, the city has used a portion of the building for its downtown fire station, after the 4th Street station was damaged in the June 2021 flooding.
Under the terms of the lease agreement, the RDC pays Sicks and Held a total of $3,500 a month, for an annual total of $42,000. In the city’s online financial system, the payments are recorded as separate monthly payments to each of them for $1,750.
Since 2019 through March 3, 2023, the city has paid them $127,000 to lease the parking lot space.
The deal with Sicks and Held also says that the city will pay the property taxes for the parcel. The city’s online financial system shows at least $53,000 in property taxes paid since 2020. Given some gaps in dates, it’s not clear that is exhaustive of the payments made.
Under state law, a redevelopment commission can pay more than the average of two fair market appraisals for property. That’s one way that an RDC is different from other governmental units.
The city’s online financial records show that at least one recent appraisal was obtained for the parking lot parcel at 216 S. College.
On Dec. 23, 2022, the city paid $2,500 to Gilbert S Mordoh & Co. for an appraisal of the property.
In the city’s online financial system, The B Square was not able to identify other payments made for recent appraisals of the property at 216 S. College.
In January, Bloomington’s city council overrode a mayoral veto of its resolution expressing support for a capital improvement board (CIB) as the governance structure for a convention center expansion. In the two months since then, there’s been little public sign of any progress on the convention center expansion project.
The Bloomington RDC meeting starts at 5 p.m. in city hall.
