DHS Ditching Coggs Center For Northwest Side
Plus: A recap of the week's real estate news
6101-6105 N. 64th St. Image from CH Coakley.
The Wisconsin Department of Health Services will relocate its Milwaukee office from the Marcia P. Coggs Human Services Center, 1220 W. Vliet St., to a redeveloped warehouse at N. 64th St. and W. Florist Ave.
CH Coakley will build out office space for the state agency in its approximately 375,000-square-foot building at 6101-6105 N. 64th St.
The state agency committed to a seven-year lease with Coakley after a request-for-proposals process. It will pay approximately $1.4 million per year for the space. DHS will relocate its Division of Medicaid Services’ Milwaukee Enrollment Services to the building.
Coakley is building out the space in partnership with JP Cullen and Plunkett Raysich Architects. The space is scheduled to be ready in November.
The moving and logistics firm acquired the property in January 2021 for $6.5 million. It came as the company realigned its holdings after selling the Gimbels/Schuster’s complex at 2151 N. Martin Luther King Jr. Dr. for redevelopment as ThriveOn King.
But the sale of one former Schuster’s department store now creates a question about the future of another. The DHS Milwaukee office is currently located in a redeveloped Schuster’s store owned by Milwaukee County.
The state’s lease with Milwaukee County was month-to-month at $3.5 million per year. Since 2010, it leased approximately 100,000 square feet in the building.
The county’s Department of Health and Human Services occupies the remainder of the 222,000-square-foot building.
The state, in a report issued in February, revealed its intention to lease space from Coakley, while explaining why it was leaving the Coggs Center.
“DHS has identified a series of deficiencies with the location that negatively impact operations including: lack of adequate safety and security provisions, lack of ADA accessibility, deferred maintenance, and lack of adequate parking for clients and staff. In addition to these factors, DHS has also reduced the space requirements for the location,” says a report.
The Wisconsin Department of Administration says it toured three spaces as part of the selection process. Its report says the new location, between W. Silver Spring Dr. and W. Mill Rd., is “more geographically aligned to the DHS Milwaukee customer base.” The current location is just northwest of Downtown.
Coakley reports owning eight warehouses with approximately two million square feet of space.
Weekly Recap
Community Within The Corridor Expects First Residents In July
A former Briggs & Stratton factory campus will welcome its first residents in the coming weeks as part of the largest one-time, private affordable housing development in Wisconsin history.
A partnership of Que El-Amin, Mikal Wesley, Rayhainio Boynes and Roers Companies is redeveloping the vacant, 6.99-acre manufacturing campus at N. 32nd St. and W. Center St. The two-block campus lines the north side of W. Center St. just west of the 30th Street railroad corridor. A city report says, much of the six-building complex, the oldest portion of which dates back to 1906, has been vacant since the 1980s.
The Community Within The Corridor, as the $66 million redevelopment is known, will create 197 units of affordable housing in four buildings and more than 60,000 square feet of space for accessory uses. Most units will be set aside at below-market rates for at least 30 years for individuals making less than 80% of the county’s median income.
A leasing website is now live and includes details for studio, one, two, three and four bedroom floor plans, leasing rates and the ability to schedule a tour.
City Says 10,000 Homes Goal On Track
Four years ago, the City of Milwaukee launched its 10,000 Homes Initiative to improve affordable housing opportunities for 10,000 households in 10 years.
By its own measurements, it is succeeding.
But housing advocates say the program, which counts the housing created by 27 different entities toward its goal, can better reach its target by including the work done by other entities in the city to put low-income Milwaukeeans into their own homes.
The goal, they said, should be counting the housing added because of the various nonprofits working toward more inclusive homeownership regardless of whether the housing is created with city aid or investment.
Rising Prices, Interest Rates Making Homes Less Affordable
Home prices have been rising for years in Wisconsin, and rising mortgage rates are pushing the cost of buying a home even higher.
The April housing report from the Wisconsin Realtors Association said the state’s median home price stood at $265,501 last month, up 13 percent from a year before.
Strong demand for homes, plus a declining number of homes for sale, have put upward pressure on prices in the state for some time.
Record-low mortgage rates have offset some of those price hikes, but now those rates are rising too. Marquette University economist David Clark said last month’s average mortgage rate was 4.98 percent.
Inside The Renovated St. Francis of Assisi Church and Monastery
The organization behind St. Ben’s and the House of Peace food and support programs for those in need has reaffirmed its commitment to Milwaukee by fully renovating its 153-year-old home at the border of the Brewers Hill and Halyard Park neighborhoods.
“This is for the next 100 years,” said Brother Mark Joseph Costello, Provincial Minister of the Capuchin Franciscan Province of St. Joseph, while leading a tour of the renovated St. Francis of Assisi Church, attached monastery and new parish center.
Located at the intersection of W. Brown St. and N. Vel R. Phillips Ave., the monastery will be home to 19 friars. Easily identified by their simple brown robes (habits) the friars have taken vows of poverty, chastity and obedience. “We preach, teach, cook, and counsel. We minister in hospitals, schools, soup kitchens, parishes, and in the mission fields. We are pastors, artists, missionaries, farmers, mechanics, and writers,” the province’s website said.
The friars, who locally work at Capuchin Community Services’ meal and other social support programs, were previously scattered in housing across the Milwaukee area, but will now be unified in a single building. The parish that calls the complex home now has a fully accessible church and new community meeting space.
Blood Center Announced As ThriveOn King Tenant
The partners behind the $105 million ThriveOn King development announced a new first-floor tenant this week.
Versiti Blood Center of Wisconsin will operate both a blood donation center and community hub on the first floor of the building, 2153 N. Martin Luther King Jr. Dr. The 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization is leasing 3,500 square feet of space in the complex, formerly a department store.
Versiti will join Malaika Early Learning Center, which was announced in April as the operator of a 14,000-square-foot early childhood education center on the first floor. A food hall targeted at startup vendors is also proposed for the first floor. The Greater Milwaukee Foundation (GMF) and Medical College of Wisconsin (MCW) are anchor tenants in the development and will lease approximately 100,000 square feet of office space.
“Versiti has proudly been part of the Milwaukee community for 75 years. While we have made great strides to address racial disparities in blood and organ donation, we know there is much work yet to do,” said Chris Miskel, Versiti President and CEO, in a statement. “Through advocacy and community outreach, Versiti hopes to further establish itself as a trusted resource and agent of change for the donors and patients we serve.”
Funeral Home Becoming Apartments
A Bay View funeral home is poised to see new life as an apartment building.
Urban Milwaukee reported in November that interior demolition was underway at the former Niemann/Suminski funeral home, 2480-2486 S. Kinnickinnic Ave. Now, a commercial alteration permit pending before the city would enable the building to be converted to housing.
The two-story, Mediterranean Revival-style building would be converted into 14 apartments.BV KK, LLC, an investment group affiliated with Tim Olson, acquired the property and an adjacent surface parking lot for $875,000 in September from an affiliate of the funeral home.
Spike Brewing Could Build New Facility
Milwaukee-based Spike Brewing, a manufacturer of brewing equipment, could build a new plant on a city-owned, vacant lot
Building permit requests indicate the company is considering building a manufacturing and office building at 4132 N. Holton St., just north of W. Capitol Dr. The footprint of the two-story building would be 62,526 square feet.
In a press release issued after this article was first published, the company confirmed it was planning a $9 million facility. The city will sell the site for $1.
Spike makes high-end brewing systems targeted at home brewers and nano breweries. Ben Caya founded the company in 2011 while he was still a mechanical engineering student at UW-Milwaukee.
New High School Planned in Bronzeville
The Dr. Howard Fuller Collegiate Academy could build a new high school in Bronzeville.
The public charter school has a pending request before the Board of Zoning Appeals to develop a new building at 2212-2228 N. Vel R. Phillips Ave. It would accommodate approximately 500 students.
The 0.86-acre site is located between W. North Ave. and W. Garfield Ave. and is across the street from the Garfield School Apartments and America’s Black Holocaust Museum. A one-story warehouse occupies the site today.
The property was acquired in 2020 for $50,000 by the VP Garfield LLC, the ThriveOn King partners, as part of the proposed redevelopment of the adjacent former Schuster’s department store at 2153 N. Martin Luther King Jr. Dr. Both properties were previously used for storage by CH Coakley.
Triskele’s Restaurant For Sale
Triskele’s, a bar and restaurant in a quiet part of Walker’s Point, away from the business districts along S. 2nd St. and S. 5th St., is for sale.
The restaurant, at 1801 S. 3rd St., is being marketed as a turnkey operation for sale by The Barry Company, a commercial real estate firm.
The restaurant, located in a building constructed in 1901, sits at the corner of W. Maple St. and S. 3rd St. on a 3,400-square-foot lot. The restaurant itself is a one-story, 1,540- square-foot building. It’s currently being listed for $349,000.
A 2021 assessment put the total value at $134,500. No doubt, the difference between the assessed value and the asking price is being driven by the current real estate market, but more importantly, its potential as a turn key restaurant opportunity.
More Renderings of Downtown ‘Iron District’ Released
The team behind the “Iron District,” a proposed entertainment, hotel and apartment complex, released more renderings Monday morning of its planned 11-acre campus. The partners also unveiled a list of project supporters.
First publicly disclosed Friday, the plan calls for an 8,000-seat soccer stadium, 3,500-person indoor concert venue, hotel and apartment building. The district, according to the development team, is expected to be completed by 2024.
A new professional soccer team would be created to play in the stadium, as well as Marquette University‘s men’s and women’s soccer and lacrosse teams using it as their home field. It would have an artificial turf playing surface.
Designed by Kahler Slater, the complex would sit on land assembled by Marquette at the southwest corner of N. 6th St. and W. Michigan St. in Milwaukee’s Westown neighborhood. The site backs up to the Marquette Interchange, with a large portion of it created by the removal of ramps during the interchange’s 2005 reconstruction.
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