Bucks Player Plans Brady Street Building

Milwaukee Bucks guard Pat Connaughton‘s second Milwaukee real estate project is now public. Connaughton, through his firm Beach House, is looking to develop a vacant, city-owned lot along E. Brady St. into a two-story building with retail space and a second-story residential unit.

The project will place Connaughton before the Historic Preservation Commission for the second time because almost all of Brady Street is included in a historic district.

Beach House is also seeking to develop a three-unit apartment building at 1247 N. Milwaukee St. that involves tearing down a home that is over 150 years old. The commission, in response to an application from Dawn McCarthy, ruled that the house is not worthy of historic designation, but McCarthy appealed that decision to the Common Council. A council committee will hear the appeal on Tuesday.

Both projects are being designed by New Berlin-based architecture firm Patera.

The Brady Street project would include a three-bedroom apartment with approximately 2,700 square feet of space, including a covered porch overlooking the Lower East Side main street. An indoor parking space would be included in a notch in the building behind the commercial space, as well a covered outdoor space.

The L-shaped commercial space includes two sets of doors that would allow it to be subdivided.

According to the application filed with the city, the building would be wood framed with a brick veneer. Stucco would be included in the porch.

The city listed the site, addressed as 1697-1699 N. Marshall St., for sale for $105,000 in 2018. If the building’s design is approved, a second file would need to be introduced for the Common Council to approve the land sale. A duplex was formerly on the site, but burned down over two decades ago.

In 2017 Scott Genke proposed to develop a $1 million, three-story building with first-floor commercial space and three apartments. Those plans were dropped in 2018.

American Family Unveils Downtown Office Plan

American Family Insurance announced Thursday it will redevelop a five-story, 110-year-old building near Fiserv Forum and Schlitz Park for its Milwaukee office.

The Madison-based company has selected the Mandel Graphics building at 1311-1325 N. Martin Luther King Jr. Dr., long home to the namesake printing company Mandel Graphic Solutions. The five-story, 293,750-square-foot building was built in 1909 for a clothing manufacturer and has had a number of different names and tenants over the ensuing century.

Led by CEO Jack Salzwedel, American Family hopes to eventually have up to 400 employees in the building, including workers handling claims, information technology and community partnerships. Redevelopment plans include adding additional floors to the top of the reinforced concrete building.

The company will partner on the building’s redevelopment with building owner MB Acquisition. The entity is led by Milwaukee real estate veteran Joel Lee and his son Dan Lee. The two operate the property through their firm Van Buren Management. Read more.

Mount Mary Plans $45 Million Complex

Mount Mary University, the School Sisters of Notre Dame and Milwaukee Catholic Home are planning a 166-unit intergenerational living complex on the university’s campus on the city’s far west side.

The $45 million complex will provide housing for the sisters of the School Sisters of Notre Dame, including assisted living units, as well as housing for single mothers attending the university and their children. An early childhood education center is also planned for the complex, available to residents, staff and the community.

“These women often have various obstacles to getting an education,” said university president Christine Pharr. She said on-campus housing would address housing, transportation and child-care issues as well as other obstacles.

The sisters will move their residence from Notre Dame of Elm Grove as part of the project. One hundred sisters currently live in Elm Grove with an additional 100 spread throughout the Milwaukee area. The international organization has over 3,000 members.

Many of the sisters are Mount Mary graduates said Pharr. The university was founded as a ministry of the School Sisters in 1913 and moved to its 80-acre home in Milwaukee in 1929.

Plans call for 52 assisted-living units for sisters who require care, 90 one-bedroom and two-bedroom apartments for sisters and other seniors, and 16 to 24 family units for undergraduate single mothers and their children.

The complex would be built on the north side of the university’s campus along W. Burleigh St. Pharr said the woods on the northeast corner of the university’s property near N. 92nd St. and W. Burleigh St. would be maintained. “We think that’s an important part of our aesthetic,” said Pharr. Learn more.

Tech Entrepreneur Buys Water Street Building

Serial entrepreneur Jeff Carr acquired the two-story office building at 530 N. Water St. for $689,000 in late November.

The building’s first-floor tenant, golf simulator and bar Fore Milwaukee, will remain. The second floor will be renovated for an undisclosed technology startup company. Built in 1947, the building contains approximately 10,000 square feet of space according to city records.

Carr, an advocate for open source software, is the co-founder of Linux variant distributor LinuxPPC, cloud services provider Digital Ocean and most recently Wit.com. The LinkedIn page for Wit.com bills the company as a “Linux based company,” with 11 to 50 employees based in Emeryville, CA.

“Mr. Carr has committed over $100,000 to improvements on both levels,” according to a statement submitted to Tom Daykin, who first reported the sale. “He looks forward to being an active part of downtown Milwaukee for decades to come.”

Carr, a Waukesha native, is reported to be moving back to Milwaukee from Silicon Valley.

Saint John’s Buys N. Farwell Ave. Building

Saint John’s on the Lake has purchased a property at 1744 N. Farwell Ave. The three-story building and its 50 parking spots is a block from the senior living community which is soon to expand to a third tower on its campus at 1800 N. Prospect Ave.

The purchase was made “in order to address the need to provide employee parking… The prior owner, Phoenix Care Systems, will continue to occupy the building and half of the parking until, at latest, September 30th, 2020,” according to Renee Anderson, President/CEO of the senior living facility. Twenty-five spaces will become immediately available, eliminating a need for employees to park and shuttle from the Marina, she says in a memo to residents. After September, 2020, all of the 50 spaces will be used for Saint John’s employee parking.

Read more of Michael Horne‘s report on the retirement community’s purchase and plans.

The “Little Pink Church” Is Back

St. Rita Square, a 118-unit senior housing complex, is rising on the Lower East Side and with it a modern version of the long-gone Blessed Virgin of Pompeii Church.

Developer James A. Tarantino is developing the six-story complex on the site of the former St. Rita Catholic Church, itself founded as a mission of the former Blessed Virgin of Pompeii congregation.

Last year Tarantino acquired and demolished St. Rita of Cascia Church, 1601 N. Cass St., and its former school to create the development site along E. Pleasant St. between N. Van Buren St. and N. Cass St.

Tarantino’s Capri Senior Communities will own and operate the market-rate senior living facility. The 118 units will include 72 independent living apartments, 20 assisted-living apartments and 26 memory-care apartments.

In exchange for acquiring the site for $1, Tarantino is constructing a new church and will sell it back to the Archdiocese of Milwaukee for $1. The new church, designed as a homage to the “Little Pink Church” in the Historic Third Ward that was demolished in 1967 for Interstate 794’s construction, will be utilized by the Three Holy Women parish led by Reverend Tim Kitzke. Read more.

Renderings

Will Tent City Come Back?

The Common Council’s Public Works Committee was briefed Wednesday morning on a green infrastructure project that will replace the “Tent City” homeless encampment under Interstate 794 near the Marquette Interchange.

But the presentation from Department of Public Works (DPW)  and Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District (MMSD) representatives didn’t answer a critical question from the committee’s chair.

“What efforts are being taken to prevent the Tent City from reappearing next April?” asked area alderman and committee chair Robert Bauman. “In case someone didn’t know, we have an event coming up next July.” Bauman was referring to the Democratic National Convention.

The encampment was largely cleared by the end of October in anticipation of the construction of a green infrastructure project. Bauman seems to suspect the project was seen as a way to prevent another tent city from popping up, but also wasn’t convinced this would work. “The spokespeople for the state came up with this green infrastructure project, which frankly I had never heard of before, which okay, fine,” he said. City and state officials, however, have said planning for the project goes back two years.

The alderman said he was happy housing was found for almost all of the residents of the 2019 iteration of the encampment, but expressed concern that allowing the encampment to re-emerge would cause not only a humanitarian issue but would create a negative perception of the city on a national stage during the Democratic convention.

“It’s not obvious how this plan will prevent camping,” said Bauman. “It looks like you’re going to still have flat ground.” Read more.

City Targets Scam Artists and Slumlords

City officials would like people who say they’re going to live in houses they buy from the city to actually do so. And now they’ve added contractual language and stiffer penalties to ensure that happens.

The move comes in response to the July revelation that a city program designed to stabilize neighborhoods by repairing damaged homes and finding owner-occupants was being abused by minister and hairstylist Hosea Bates. The city spent $128,000 on repairs to a home in the Concordia neighborhood and sold it to Bates for $7,500 with the understanding he would live in it, only to see him use it as a rental property. The revelation, brought to the city’s attention by area resident and state representative Evan Goyke, drew the ire of Alderman Bauman. “This is borderline criminal. This is borderline theft,” said Bauman in July.

The city’s Housing Infrastructure Preservation Fund has been used to rehabilitate more than 50 houses for home ownership in the past 10 years. Owner occupancy is required for a period of five years. If Bates is found not to live in the property he would be subject to a fine of the purchase price of the house or $25,000, whichever is greater. “This guy will gladly pay us $25,000,” said Bauman in July.

New buyers won’t be able to get away with a bait and switch so easily. New policies have gone into effect, including doubling the fine, that are designed to ensure compliance. Learn more.