Michigan Street Commons Nears Completion

Michigan Street Commons. Photo by Jeramey Jannene.

The first piece of the Iron District development at the southwestern corner of downtown Milwaukee is nearly ready.

The Michigan Street Commons apartment complex, 915 W. Michigan St., backs up to the Marquette Interchange. When it opens in the coming months it will offer 99 affordable one and two bedroom apartments. A leasing website is now live.

The development is being subsidized by federal low-income housing tax credits. Bear Development secured the competitively-awarded credits in spring 2021. For a period of 30 years, all of the apartments in the $27.5 million development will be set aside at below-market rates for households making no more than 60% of Milwaukee County’s median income. Twenty-nine of the units will have a max income of 50% of the area median income.

The credits provide up-front capital to developers in exchange for specific units being leased out at rates targeted at 30% of a household’s income.

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

Bear’s contracting arm, Construction Management Associates, is leading the general contracting. Kahler Slater is serving as the project architect.

The larger development is slated to eventually include an outdoor soccer stadium, hotel and a second apartment building, constructed atop a largely-vacant office building. The second apartment building replaces a proposed concert venue that would have competed with a new venue near Fiserv Forum.

The soccer stadium, and a proposed soccer team, continue to inch forward. The team, owned by Kacmarcik Enterprises, was first announced in 2022 with an expected first game in 2025, but has now been delayed until 2026. The effort to build an 8,000-seat stadium for the Milwaukee team in the Iron District development received a major boost on Nov. 2. Governor Tony Evers used his unilateral authority to allocate $9.3 million from a federal grant to the more than $40 million building. The Wisconsin State Legislature had previously stripped Evers’ proposal to use state bonding to support the project from the state capital budget.

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.

Along N. 6th Street, the opposite end of the 10-acre Iron District site, deconstruction of a former Ramada hotel is now complete.

Following Michigan Street to the east end of Downtown, Bear is engaged in the redevelopment of the Johnson Controls (JCI) complex. JCI will move out later this year, with Bear CEO S.R. Mills announcing earlier this week that a “significant component” of the seven-building complex will remain office space. Other buildings on the property could be redeveloped for residential uses.

The company is also clearing the Filer & Stowell site for the development of a 576-unit affordable housing development on the border of Bay View and the Harbor District.

Photos

Apartment Building Rendering and Site Plan