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Historic Preservation Commission <br />Meeting Minutes <br />21 December 2020 <br />Page 13 of 14 <br />community. Economically, this project was a good investment because it had been vacant for so <br />long. She stated that this was a way for historic preservation to get another business downtown <br />and preserve another space. <br />Dunlap stated that he thought the amount was out -of -kilter and noted that it was about $1,500 <br />per square foot for the preservation area and the comparison numbers for other projects was <br />closer to $200 per square foot, which made him uncomfortable because the proportions were <br />not even close. He would definitely like to see the place preserved and landmarked. <br />Haley recalled that 740 Front was a larger project by square footage and covering four sides of <br />the building. <br />Johnson replied that the north side of 740 Front presented more frontage to deal with but there <br />was a lot more there to start working with, whereas 809 Main had so much deterioration on the <br />building. 740 Front did not have to do a full redo. <br />Busa asked about the total cost of 740 Front. <br />Johnson replied that he thought it was around $1.5 million for the total. <br />Klemme added that that project was from 2014 dollars, not 2020 dollars. <br />Johnson projected that if 740 Front were to come forward today you'd be looking at a similar <br />situation, though he added that it was conjecture. <br />Busa summarized that the projects were more in line with apples to apples than not. <br />Johnson agreed. He added that when he was starting to present more projects last year, the <br />fund was around $2.2 million and it was striking that the Fund had spent a lot of money this <br />year, and yet it remained at a pretty high amount, and his question was at what point do we start <br />spending this money. He stated that it's not a reason just to spend it, but the downtown area <br />was challenged to have a deep enough building stock to participate in this program. He did not <br />know if there would be any more projects like this any time soon. <br />Haley stated that this building was privately owned but it was also to some extent a public space <br />and it was an investment. <br />Zuccaro reminded the Commission that the Empire was landmarked in October 2019 and that <br />they had received a bonus and a grant to redo their sign, but they have not done major <br />renovation. He added that the City had invested $500,000 in the Grain Elevator for stabilization. <br />Klemme stated that she thought the Fund was higher than when she started on the Commission <br />and that the citizens had asked for the Commission to preserve these structures. <br />Klemme made a motion to landmark 809 Main Street. Parris seconded. Motion passed <br />unanimously by roll call vote. <br />Klemme made a motion to approve the Alteration Certificate. Parris seconded. Motion passed <br />unanimously by roll call vote. <br />13 <br />