Council Committee Approves $100 Million Deer District, MATC Project
Technical college to pay millions to include new athletic facility in mixed-use development.
Block 5 Apartments with a fieldhouse in the base. Rendering by EUA.
The Milwaukee Common Council is poised to approve a large housing and athletics development on a vacant lot near Fiserv Forum.
The Zoning, Neighborhoods & Development Committee unanimously recommended approval of a zoning change for J. Jeffers & Co.‘s approximately $100 million, 269-unit project, called Block 5 Apartments, on Tuesday morning.
In addition to the apartments and 13,000 square feet of commercial space, the development would also include a 28,000-square-foot fieldhouse and fitness center for Milwaukee Area Technical College (MATC). The college’s downtown campus is located on the opposite side of Fiserv Forum and it would gain its first dedicated fitness center and student athletics complex from the development.
The proposed complex is an outgrowth of partnership between MATC and Jeffers that created the student housing project called Westown Green in the former Milwaukee Journal Sentinel complex. That development, which includes affordable housing for 195 MATC students in 83 units, opened in 2021. A market-rate development, Journal Commons, followed it in another part of the complex in 2022.
“We think a healthy ecosystem has all of those things,” said Jeffers chief development officer Brian Loftin to the zoning committee Tuesday. The latest development wouldn’t have affordable housing, but instead would include the athletics complex to allow the college to add four teams and establish a true home court for its existing basketball and volleyball teams. “You won’t even know there is a field house there because you’re seeing the residential wrap that’s around it,” Loftin noted.
The complex would be built on the 2.19-acre block bounded by W. McKinley Avenue, W. Juneau Ave., N. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Drive and N. Vel R. Phillips Avenue. It would fill a block between the Aloft Hotel and The Trade Hotel. At its peak, it would rise to seven stories. A rooftop deck and community room would face the Deer District plaza and Fiserv Forum to the south, while the fieldhouse would be located to the north. At the northeast corner, where underground Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District infrastructure prohibits development, a new 18,000 plaza would be developed. A parking structure would be placed in the middle of the block, wrapped by the structure and only accessible via N. Vel R. Phillips Avenue.
Loftin said Jeffers continues to pursue a skating rink for the plaza and would install utility infrastructure to make it feasible. “We think it’s a nice piece for tenants, but we think it’s also a nice piece for the community as a whole,” he told the committee.
Construction on the privately-financed development would start this summer. The fieldhouse would be completed in August and the remainder of the development would take an additional six months. The Milwaukee Bucks, which received the former Park East Freeway and Sydney HiH site for $1 as part of the Fiserv Forum subsidy, would contribute the land as equity to the development. The site, most recently, has been used for construction staging and temporary parking. Eppstein Uhen Architects is leading the complex’s design.
Loftin said the estimated blended rental rate is $2.70 per square foot, resulting in a 1,000-square-foot apartment costing $2,700 per month. “We project that this will be one of the best class A apartment buildings in Downtown,” said developer Joshua Jeffers in 2023 when the project was first announced.
The committee unanimously endorsed the zoning change.
For more on the building’s design and the site’s potential complications, see our January coverage from the City Plan Commission‘s project review.
MATC’s Complicated, Expensive Lease
Developing and operating a new field house will not be cheap for MATC.
The college will pay $15.5 million for the space over a 10-year lease and incur an additional $1.7 million one-time expense for equipment to furnish the facility. It’s also expected to pay at least $250,000 extra annually for utilities, common area maintenance, property taxes and insurance.
But leasing, furnishing and insuring the space isn’t the end of the technical college’s financial commitment.
According to a January 2025 Wisconsin Technical College System agenda, the district would also add 17 staff members over a five-year ramp-up period to operate the facility, recruit students and coach new teams. The annual expense when fully staffed is expected to be $1.18 million annually. That includes two recruiters, listed at $91,000 each.
The college would recoup an estimated $100,000 annually from leasing the facility to the Milwaukee Bucks. But, according to the WTC system agenda, that lease has not been negotiated. The agenda says the team has “shown an intent” to lease space in the complex.
MATC also projects earning $1,000 per sporting event, initially estimated at 15 times per year. The college also hopes to secure an undisclosed amount of revenue by offering memberships to building residents.
The college would have a new athletic facility open to all students, and it would also have multiple new sports teams.
MATC currently offers men’s and women’s basketball, women’s volleyball, men’s and women’s tennis, men’s and women’s soccer, men’s baseball and women’s softball. According to a report, it predicts each team would grow by 2030 and four new teams would be added: men’s volleyball, women’s lacrosse and men’s and women’s cross country.
Total participation in the college’s sports teams, according to the plan, would grow from 137 students in 2024 to 251 in 2030.
“This transformative space creates opportunities for our student-athletes to connect to their passion, and it enhances the college experience for all students,” said MATC president Anthony Cruz at a January lease signing event.
Renderings
Earlier January Renderings and Site Plan
2023 Renderings
Site Photos and Early Conceptual Renderings
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