What is the rush? Why not step back and reevaluate the options?

The majority of elected officials would argue this has not been rushed.  One council rejected an assisted living development that ultimately ended up beside Grandview Middle School, after the recession many developers came forward and wanted to build large scale apartment complexes which were also rejected. In the mid 2000’s this property was actively marketed in a bull market (as previously stated) to no avail.  In addition, when the concept of a new downtown was developed in the late 1990’s no one anticipated Mound Marketplace would be developed. That land was owned by the school district and the thought at the time was it would become a community center. That development consumed much of the market share of what the area could support in terms of new retail/commercial, which was later confirmed by the 2013 market study. Mound has many commercial vacancies at all rent levels, old and new. The city retains a large share of the property abutting Commerce Boulevard which is ideal for commercial development, but requires the cooperation of the private property owners. The consensus during the 2040 Comp Plan discussions was that mixed use is best achieved horizontally across a district and not residential over commercial, which has had mixed success in more populous areas than Mound. The area along Commerce has exciting potential and can only be helped by more rooftops, as the saying goes.

The TIF district expires in 2031 and the City can collect 100% of the property taxes from new development until that time. With no new development, the taxpayers will fund up to $4M in debt service and costs to improve the space.  With a project, the taxpayer responsibility will be reduced from $4M to $1.235M and the improvements in the remaining public spaces will be paid for from the new tax increments and sale of the land. Look for more to come on a visioning of what the remaining public spaces could be.