New Land Enterprises and Wiechman Enterprises were seeking a change in zoning and a loan guarantee by the City of Milwaukee for the Bookends North project. The project would be located at 700 E. Kilbourn Ave., the former Edwardo’s Pizza location, and includes 224 luxury apartments, 294 parking spots, and 3,000 square feet of retail space.

The Moderne, if approved, would be located at 1141 N. Old World Third St. The high-rise project would include 203 rental units, 14 condominiums, 214 parking spots, and a retail component. The plan included expanding the Park East TID by $11 million to provide for $9.3 million in loans for the Moderne , $650,000 for the construction of a new park, and $850,000 for administrative costs. The majority of funding for the project, a $41.4 million loan, would be serviced through Capmark Financial Group, funded with AFL-CIO pension funds, and guaranteed by HUD.

Harry Drea, one of the developers of the Rivianna project, was before the committee to request an amendment to the previously approved General Planned Development, and approval of the Detailed Planned Development. The change to the original General Planned Development was to include the building’s parapet, it was an increase of four feet three inches to the buildings height, but overall the massing of the project stayed essentially the same.

This meeting had a couple of topics of particular interest, the use of eminent domain, and TIF policy.

Planning for the future of Milwaukee as the Fresh Coast appears to be moving ahead.  Over one hundred companies and five of the largest water companies in the world have a presence in the Milwaukee area.  The City of Milwaukee and UWM are working to tap into this resource by creating a water research district [...]

Even during this economic downturn the City of Milwaukee continues its efforts to cleanup environmentally contaminated sites within the city and prepare them for redevelopment.  Superficially, this file would give blight designation to six city owned lots, in the Riverworks area, which will allow the Redevelopment Authority of the City of Milwaukee to obtain EPA [...]

Martin Collins’ retirement left the Department of Neighborhood Services with a significant leadership gap.  Art Dahlberg, from Richmond, VA has been tabbed as the person to replace Mr. Collins as the Commissioner of Neighborhood Services and clearly the committee was cautiously optimistic.  He expressed his understanding of the position he’s walking into saying that “I [...]

We had originally speculated about the origins of the ban on carry-ins at Jazz in the Park. Our speculation was that it was really a money issue, but that we thought the East Town Association had the right to and should attempt to generate money from the event.

Today we received just about all we needed to confirm our suspicions, a couple of great quotes from the Milwaukee Chief of Police Edward Flynn courtesy of the Journal Sentinel article Jazz in the Park fans have a whine and cheese party.

The Northeast Side Area Plan which will lay out the vision and guidelines for development within this a large portion of the city was brought forward for approval.  Alderman Bauman proposed two amendments both of which impacted the location of future University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee expansions.  One amendment would of made it part of the plan [...]

Two significant East Side projects, New Land Enterprises’ Kenilworth apartment building and Mandel Group’s dormitory proposal, were on the agenda for this committee meeting.

First up was New Land Enterprises’ Kenilworth apartment building proposal. This proposal had been held at the previous committee meeting to allow for an “informational” meeting with the neighborhood. As the committee had indicated at the prior meeting they felt that overall this was a positive development for the city. It was approved and will now go before the full Common Council.