City Council Minutes 2019 06 11 - Laserfiche WebLink

Home Browse Search

City Council Meeting Minutes June 11 2019 Page 8 of 15 Councilmember Stolzmann stated there needs to be a unique situation and this is a two story office building and not a unique situation She doesn't want to set this precedent for office buildings when we already get complaints rents are too high She wants to send a clear signal on what type of properties we are trying to incentivize Councilmember Loo asked Mr Sinkey why they were having trouble getting retail on Main Street. Sinkey stated for these buildings, one is too deep to function as retail and the other is a viable retail building but needs major remodeling which may not make financial sense In general on Main Street, he feels his business provides a vital daytime population as would any office The uniqueness of this proposal is to change what is functionally not working currently More office would contribute to the retail community of Main Street. This project is unique because if fundamentally begins to change the density of office dwellers downtown Building physical spaces designed for retail is the first step and having office workers to contribute would be an enormous benefit. Mayor Muckle stated one of the most important things in Louisville has been what policies would be good for downtown and good for old town neighborhoods As a result he supported the URA as we needed a walkable critical mass of people While not an easy decision in the end, this is why he supports the building Business owners often report a lack of day time population The building meets the goal of improving retail opportunity on the ground floor and providing office space He feels some of the requests made by Council for the new building may have created the financial gap that the developers now face Councilmember Stolzmann said Council did not request anything The application was withdrawn and resubmitted with a new design Mayor Muckle said for this request we should help facilitate it in terms of offering to give back funds that wouldn't be generated otherwise The reasons he supports the building are what make it reasonable to support the request. He agreed with the concern about ending up with an office building, but this new building will be current modern retail space and have a better chance of generating sales tax in that location that we don't have now Councilmember Loo stated she remembers very vocal Council and public objection to the original application The applicant listened to the meeting and came back with this design Councilmember Loo stated this application boils down to a bird in hand versus possibly nothing It guarantees a building that is worth much more than the current one and after 10 years all of the tax money will come back to all of the entities and it will be several million dollars more than what is there now It is true we don't know what else might happen, but we know it will be better than what is there She is interested in looking at the 50-90% range Councilmember Keany stated he feels similar to Councilmember Loo He is not sure 90% is appropriate He hears from many businesses downtown that the daytime population is