Next downtown development?
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“Depending on who is looking at the site and picturing the future, it would be a great place for a water park or a multiuse sports center or a mix of apartments, restaurants and retail stores. Or it would have been a great place for a downtown ball stadium.

City leaders have long envisioned something special there. With 29 acres of land – for the most part, level and free of buildings – space is plentiful. The location is ideal – across the river from and just north of Headwaters Park, across Clinton Street from Lawton Park and Science Central, a moderate walk from downtown.

Still, with a deadline looming, formidable obstacles to a city-led development remain. The current price tag – up to $4.3 million – is most likely beyond the immediate reach of a city government just beginning to cope with new property tax laws that will reduce budgets.”

“Now called the North River area, the property northwest of Clinton and Fourth streets is the former home of OmniSource’s metal recycling operation. Calhoun Investments, a company controlled by the Rifkin family – former owners of OmniSource before it was sold to Steel Dynamics Inc. – is offering to sell the land to the city. Under Richard, the city paid $25,000 for an option, placing a hold on the property until Dec. 31, 2007. The owners agreed to a six-month extension – with a new expiration deadline only about six weeks away.

“We continue to negotiate with the Rifkin family,” said Deputy Mayor Mark Becker. “Concluding the negotiations is a high priority,” and officials still hope agreement can be reached in June.”

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“One possible source of money, City Councilman John Shoaff said, is the City Light Lease fund, scheduled to reach maturity next year with an estimated balance of $40 million.

The city’s option to purchase lists a maximum price of $4.3 million, but city officials would not be disappointed if the Rifkin family – newly enriched by the $1 billion sale of OmniSource to Steel Dynamics Inc., including $425 million in cash – decided to donate the property, or least slash the asking price.

The option to buy includes language that would allow the owners to treat any sales amount less than fair market value as a gift for tax purposes.”

[...]

“The current option to purchase, however, states the city would buy the property as is, “without any warranty as to condition or environmental issues.” The owners would give the city “all relevant environmental information in its possession concerning the environmental condition of the property.”

The city has paid more than $68,000 for an environmental consultant to inspect the site, including soil borings and groundwater samples. But city officials refuse to release the results of the studies, saying state law permits them to remain sealed.

“We can’t share that,” Becker said, “while we’re under negotiations with them.”

The secrecy breeds skepticism about the site, though it may well not be as polluted as many people believe.”

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“The current option to purchase expires June 30, and city officials want to make a deal by then, even if they are unsure of the exact uses.

In addition to the mixed-use recommendation from the task force, “there’s a lot of other alternatives,” Becker said, “the worst of which, it would remain undeveloped for a long, long time.””