Main Street Landing Developer Requests Help from City Council

The developer of the Main Street Landing project wants a promise of financial assistance from New Port Richey to help complete the unfinished multi-story complex on the Pithlachascotee River.

Discussion with City Manager John Schneiger hasn’t yielded what he wants.

So on Tuesday, Ken McGurn took his request straight to New Port Richey City Council members.

“I’m back pressing for some type of written, formal agreement” for assistance, he said.

He was offered sympathy. He was offered appreciation for the work he has done on completing the building façade.

He was not offered city money.

McGurn, president of Gainesville-based McGurn Management Company, has been working to develop Main Street Landing since 2004. Proposed as a commercial-residential development, it stalled in 2006 and then further slowed down in 2008

Then it restarted in 2010 with the help of an injection of federal stimulus funds and McGurn's own money. In early January, the City Council approved an agreement that would let the developer finish the shell of the first building of the complex at River Road and Main Street. The city wanted the building to look from the outside as if it were finished.

McGurn said workers this month are completing 90 percent of the framing, setting the steel and finishing the block work. He said he is employing 18 people, eight full-time and 10 part-time, in August.

McGurn said he spends $70,000 a month on the project on average and will spend $800,000 on it this year.

Deputy Mayor asked how close Main Street Landing is to being inhabitable.

“It’s not close,” McGurn responded. “There’s just no money to do that.” 

That would take at least another year of work, he said.

McGurn said he has not been able to get financing from banks to help with the project. 

“I want something (from the city) that says, ‘Yes, five years from now, we can do something,' McGurn later told members of the press.

In recent months, McGurn requested to Schneiger that the city pay annual property tax increases, or tax-incremental financing, to the project. When a property like Main Street Landing is included in a CRA, its most recent assessed value is frozen as the base, and future property taxes are added onto that.

Money from the frozen base is given to the county, city and other taxing agencies. The CRA receives increases above that "base" for improvements within its redevelopment area.

New Port Richey’s general fund is anticipated to start subsidizing its Community Redevelopment Agency fund in fiscal year 2013, which has racked up a debt of $21 million.

“Our first responsibility is to pay off the debt,” Schneiger told the council.

Schneiger said he and McGurn met for more than an hour before the meeting Tuesday to discuss alternatives.

McGurn brought to the council a packet of incentives offered in Gainesville for developers, including a CRA tax increment financing program, facade grant and other forms of assistance.

"I'm out there on a limb," he said. "...That limb's getting awfully weak."

Councilwoman Judy DeBella Thomas said the city Council empathizes with McGurn's situation. She said the packet was worth a look.

"Hopefully, Mr. McGurn will continue what he's doing."

Councilman Bob Langford said that people have noticed the work being done on the building.

“We don’t hear the complaints that we did,” he said.

Mayor Bob Consalvo said he knew that the city didn't give McGurn anything concrete. It does the community good to see something that no longer looks like an abandoned building, Consalvo said.

“I wish there was more that we could do,” Consalvo said. “My idea is for you and Mr. Schneiger to work closely.”

McGurn said he plans to follow up with Schneiger this week.

Other Business:

At the council meeting, members also approved a $15,250 contract awarded to Colorado firm Ballard, King and Associates Ltd. for a marketing and user fee study for the New Port Richey Recreation and Aquatic Center, which the city wil have to subsidize $760,000 in operating costs for in the fiscal year 2012 budget. The city also needs to contnue paying off the debt service on the building.  Ballard, King and Associates Ltd.  has proposed starting with a workshop and visit in New Port Richey, submitting recommendations within 45 days of the contract being awarded and turning in a final report two weeks after the recommendations are approved.