Michigan Street Commons. Image from Bear Development.

Construction work is expected to start in the coming weeks on the Iron District, a proposed mixed-use development at the southwest corner of Downtown.

But while the planned soccer stadium and concert venue drew heavy interest when the development was first announced in May, it’s actually an affordable apartment building that will be going up first. A vacant hotel will also be coming down.

The Wisconsin Housing and Economic Development Authority awarded the 99-unit Michigan Street Commons building federal low-income housing tax credits in 2021. The credits provide capital in exchange for the requirement that all of the units are set aside at below-market rates for individuals making no more than 60% of the county’s median income.

A building permit request gives its future address as 900 W. Michigan St. and indicates Construction Management Associates will construct the building. The contractor is an arm of developer Bear Development, which is serving as the master developer of the project. Kahler Slater is leading the design.

The city is to provide $1.8 million via a tax incremental financing (TIF) district to close a gap in the building’s financing package. The city is to provide Bear the funding incrementally, with interest, based on increased property tax revenue generated by the building itself. The city routinely uses TIF districts now to enable affordable housing developments to move forward without taking on the risk of a failed project.

A Bear representative said in June that the building is designed to stand alone from the rest of the Iron District development. And it might have to, at least for some time.

Urban Milwaukee previously reported that the $160 million project, which also includes an 8,000-seat soccer stadium, 3,500-person-capacity concert venue and hotel, could require a significant amount of public subsidy for the soccer stadium. A financing proposal has not been publicly introduced.

But Bear is already on the clock for the apartment building. The TIF district requires construction to start by September and be substantially completed by March 2024.

Work is also to begin soon on razing the former Ramada Hotel along N. 6th St. at the eastern edge of the site. Initial renderings for the complex depicted the vacant hotel as still standing, but a project announcement described it as a future development site.

A permit request pending before the Department of Neighborhood Services indicates contractor Recyclean intends to deconstruct, not demolish, the structure, 633 W. Michigan St. The environmentally-friendly strategy involves disassembling a building where possible to salvage reusable materials instead of mechanical demolition.

The seven-story, 155-room hotel was built in 1967, but closed in 2018. It was one of several properties sold by Marquette University to the Iron District team in June for $12.3 million. Marquette assembled the approximately 10-acre site over the past decade for a planned athletics and research center, but ultimately dropped those plans.

No demolition permit is pending for the two-story, 132,334-square-foot office building at 803 W. Michigan St. But the building would eventually need to be demolished to make way for the Iron District development. The city has already taken the formal step of legally vacating the portions of N. 8th St. and N. 9th St. that straddle the building. The one-block-long W. McAuley Pl. at the rear of the building is a state-controlled right-of-way, a remnant of the Marquette Interchange, that was named as such in 1970 and would be removed if the development progresses.

A 19,779-square-foot office building, addressed as 525 N. 6th St., is located in the Iron District site. But similar to the Ramada immediately to its north, it does not need to be immediately demolished and is east of the proposed stadium. It has been actively used in recent years by Marquette’s Department of Psychology.

A new professional soccer team would be created to play in the stadium, and the Marquette‘s men’s and women’s soccer and lacrosse teams would also use it as their home field. It would have an artificial turf playing surface.

The soccer stadium development is being led by Jim Kacmarcik, the CEO of Kapco Metal Stamping and Kacmarcik Enterprises. Kacmarcik owns the Forward Madison men’s soccer team and is a minority investor in the Milwaukee Bucks.

The new concert venue would be operated by the Pabst Theater Group in partnership with an undisclosed national partner.

The hotel would include 140 guest rooms and a rooftop deck overlooking the soccer stadium.

Bear completed the 49-unit 700 Lofts affordable apartment complex in 2015 at 700 W. Michigan St., just across the street from the Iron District site.

Site Photos

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Apartment Building Rendering and Site Plan

Iron District Renderings

Weekly Recap

Taxco Apartment Complex Nears Completion

The Taxco Apartments building, the largest new building constructed in Walker’s Point in several years, is scheduled to open in December.

It will fill a half block of S. 5th St. between W. Bruce St. and W. Pierce St., replacing a series of smaller buildings including the former home of La Fuente restaurant.

But the 141-unit, market-rate building might become best recognized for its back side, where a six-story mural of the late singer Selena stands tall over the adjacent Zocalo Food Park. It was painted by Mauricio Ramirez, replacing a significantly smaller mural that was lost when the warehouse it was painted on was demolished to create the new building site. Ramirez’ new mural, which was completed in June, is now complemented on the first floor by several murals painted by current Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design students.

What could have been an underwhelming alley at the back of a modern building will be a detour worth taking, at least once general contractor Catalyst Construction and the several subcontractors working on the project no longer have their equipment parked along it.

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Northridge Unsecured, Owners Face $26,000 In Fines

The City of Milwaukee’s efforts to demolish the long-shuttered Northridge Mall secured a boost Friday.

Milwaukee County Circuit Court Judge William Sosnay said he intends to enforce a $2,000 per day fine for failure to secure the mall. The Chinese ownership group failed to meet an Aug. 19 date to secure the mall and now faces at least $26,000 in fines.

“If somebody thinks those won’t be paid or enforced, they are sadly mistaken, because they are dealing with the wrong judge,” Sosnay said on Friday during a status hearing.

The mall closed in 2003 and has been owned by U.S. Black Spruce Enterprise Group since 2008. The current owners previously proposed creating an Asian marketplace, but those plans have never advanced. Four fires have damaged the 900,000-square-foot complex this summer and a number of social media posts indicate trespassing regularly occurs at the property. City officials claim the mall is now becoming a substantial drain on public safety resources.

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Inflation Reduction Act Could Usher In Roof Top Solar Boom

Financial incentives in the recently approved federal Inflation Reduction Act could help thousands of Wisconsin homeowners install solar panels or pursue energy efficiency projects.

The act signed by President Joe Biden on Aug. 16 provides nearly $370 billion for the clean energy transition to combat climate change. That’s set to increase incentives to improve energy efficiency and install renewable energy for Wisconsin homeowners.

The legislation passed along party lines with only Democrats supporting the package as Republicans objected to the sweeping climate investment. Wisconsin Democrats in Congress said the law would make the nation cleaner and more energy independent, putting the country on a path to cut emissions 40 percent by 2030. At the same time, the state’s Republican lawmakers called it a “tax-and-spending bonanza” that contained too many corporate incentives for green industry amid soaring inflation.

Regardless of political viewpoints, the law contained many incentives for homeowners and companies to go green. Here are some of the measures that could affect Wisconsin.

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Author, YIMBY Nolan Gray Headlining Urban Spaceship Conference

The Urban Spaceship conference is back for its third year, this time with a focus on growing Milwaukee’s population.

The theme for the one-day conference is “growing Milwaukee to a million person city.” It builds on Mayor Cavalier Johnson‘s campaign goal of growing the city’s population to one million residents.

The conference will take place Nov. 15 at Nō Studios, 1037 W. McKinley Ave., in The Brewery District. The event is hosted by NEWaukee and NAIOP Wisconsin, with Greenfire Management serving as the presenting sponsor.

Author M. Nolan Gray headlines the list of confirmed speakers. Gray, research director for California YIMBY (Yes in My Backyard) and former city planner, published “Arbitrary Lines” in June. The book explores how zoning damaged American cities and argues that it should be abolished.

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Goodwill Donating Building To Charter School

People have donated millions of items to Goodwill, and the nonprofit organization is now donating an entire building to a charter school.

Goodwill Industries of Southeast Wisconsin announced this week it will transfer ownership of the one-story, 59,122-square-foot building at 4030 N. 29th St. to the Dr. Howard Fuller Collegiate Academy (HFCA).

The donation, valued at $600,000, comes as part of the school’s $25 million campaign to renovate the building, currently used by the school, and construct a new high school in Bronzeville.

Goodwill owned the structure, located along W. Capitol Dr., for more than 30 years. It was used as a hub for job placement services and known as Job Center North under a public-private partnership. But Goodwill listed it for sale in 2011 and HFCA began leasing the nearly-windowless facility in 2013.

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Lawsuit Dropped Over East Side Apartments

A proposal to develop a new four-story, 55-unit apartment building on N. Hackett Ave. got a boost Monday. The neighbors suing over the project voluntarily withdrew their lawsuit.

“We are withdrawing the lawsuit, for now,” says the opposition group’s website. “Realizing that the lawsuit we had filed August 18th is complicating communication with the city, developers, and others, we are filing a motion with the court today to withdraw it. At least we were able to get some of our points across. Is such a big jump in zoning really necessary? Why?”

The suit had yet to actually delay the project, but it did cause the City Plan Commission to spend approximately an hour in closed session last week. The commission later recommended approval of the new building, as did the Historic Preservation Commission in July. The Common Council is to render a final decision in the coming weeks.

The multi-faceted project, from St. Mark’s Episcopal Church and developer Michael DeMichele, would replace a failing 1940s addition to the 111-year-old church at 2604-2644 N. Hackett Ave., and would be financed in part by selling vacant land and a small parking lot to DeMichele so he can develop a market-rate apartment building. Parking would be accommodated underneath the apartment building and in a nearby, underutilized structure on N. Downer Ave.

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County Offers $500,000 For Affordable Housing Project

Milwaukee County is moving to assist a redevelopment project in South Milwaukee that would include more than 60 units of affordable housing.

Milwaukee-based developer Que El-Amin‘s company Scott Crawford Inc. has been working to advance a mixed-use redevelopment of three office buildings on the former Bucyrus campus, 1100 Milwaukee Ave. in South Milwaukee, into 160 apartments and loft-style units, including 67 affordable housing units. The project appeared to fall apart earlier this year when it was reported that the property owners, industrial real estate firm Reich Brothers, would not move forward with a sale.

Now, the Milwaukee County Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) is looking to provide $500,000 in federal funds to the project. The money comes from the federal Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) program. The COVID-19 pandemic and “supply chain issues” have led to a surplus of CDBG funds, much of it in the department’s home repair program, and “Funds need to be reallocated by October 2022 for projects that are ‘shovel ready’ per HUD guidelines,” the department said in a recent report. Existing CDBG grantees were notified of the surplus funding.

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Fight Over Former Columbia Hospital Heads Back To Court

A panel of three appeals court judges now controls the future of the former Columbia Hospital, and possibly whether local governments can historically protect state-owned buildings.

The City of Milwaukee is appealing a judge’s ruling that UW-Milwaukee could proceed with the demolition of the oldest portion of the former Columbia Hospital. If the city is successful, it could halt the demolition of the building for the second time, while also leaving open the possibility that the building is ultimately demolished.

The city formally approved designating the structure as historic in April, which established the requirement for UWM to apply for a certificate of appropriateness to demolish or modify the 103-year-old structure. But Milwaukee County Circuit Court Judge Kevin Martens ruled on June 30 that the city’s requirement is a local permitting matter from which the state is exempt and shortly thereafter dismissed the city’s initial lawsuit.

As Urban Milwaukee reported, UWM, through contractor JP Cullen, began highly visible demolition work, including removing windows, while Historic Preservation Commission members publicly and privately debated whether to appeal the ruling.

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Koz’s Mini Bowl For Sale

Koz’s Mini Bowl, a long-standing southside establishment, is up for sale after more 44 years in business.

Koz’s, 2076-2078 S. 7th St., has everything you might expect from the quintessential Milwaukee neighborhood bar: billiards, darts, a vintage jukebox and plenty of taplines—plus a few things you wouldn’t, like the carpenter’s shed worth of rusty tools hanging on the wood-paneled walls or the taxidermy lion sporting a Pabst hat atop his mane.

Expected or not, everything in the 3,540-square-foot business, plus two second-story residential apartments, would be included in the sale. With a list price of $499,000, the place is marketed as a turnkey operation with a stable customer base.

Koz’s is a Milwaukee favorite, but has also garnered popularity far beyond city limits. In fact, the Historic Mitchell Street bar holds a slew of titles: Koz’s was named one of the top 13 most romantic places in Wisconsin, made Esquire’s 2012 list of Best Bars in America and received a notable mention from Thrillist.

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Mayor Johnson Moves to Concordia Neighborhood

Mayor Cavalier Johnson has a new home in a new neighborhood to go with his new job.

Johnson and his wife Dominique sold their ranch house on N. 63rd St. near W. Capitol Dr. and purchased a 120-year-old mansion in the city’s Historic Concordia neighborhood on the city’s near West Side.

The Johnsons paid $350,000 for the Tudor Revival-style house, which city assessment records indicate has 4,094 square feet of finished space. It’s a price per square foot that would make mayors in virtually every other major American city jealous, and a large vote of confidence by Johnson in the future of the Near West Side.

The house is in a location nearly as diverse as the city. Within a couple blocks, the mayor can find an office building, a high school, multiple apartment buildings and a mix of single-family and duplex houses. At least one of the apartment buildings is a subsidized affordable housing development, while another is owned by one of the city’s largest landlords and its most prolific evictor, Berrrada Properties.

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