By JAY YOUNG-CCO Staff Writer
APRIL 22, 2024
The developer for 420 Main Street is expected to soon secure a construction loan, setting off a chain of events that includes the City borrowing $9.6 million for an underground parking garage at the location.
City attorney Nick Cirignano said developer CRG of Indianapolis is expected to close on its loan with Old National Bank in April. The Evansville Redevelopment Commission agreed in December to delay a ground-breaking deadline after then-Mayor Lloyd Winnecke said the developer was navigating a volatile finance market.
The above photo is the site of the 400 block of Main Street has mostly been used as a storage site for other city projects since the demolition of the previous structure in 2021.
Winnecke is now the CEO of the Evansville Regional Economic Partnership, which controls the entity that owns the property. The closing of the construction loan triggers multiple events. Developer CRG must return the $1.9 million the City loaned for the 2021 implosion of the previous structure. That money belongs to Evansville’s bond bank, which provides short-term, low-interest funding.
The short-term loan is among investments already attached to the property. The state, through the Southwest Indiana Regional Development Authority, this year provided $3.8 million for the project. Beth McFaddin-Higgins, SWIRDA chairwoman, said that money will assist with site preparation and the underground parking garage.
SWIRDA is the government agency that receives state funds through the READI program. It pays E-REP to administer those funds.
E-REP also received a $900,000 bridge loan in 2022 from Evansville’s United Leasing. That money helped cover the cost of demolishing the old 18-story structure, said Candace Chapman, EREP’s director of downtown development.
The old building decayed beyond repair under the ownership of a Maryland company, which sold the property for $1.8 million in 2019 to the now E-REP entity. The original redevelopment plan was for an 18-story, mixed-use building at the site. That plan changed after the original developer bailed on the project, and the current plan calls for a 161-unit, four-story building with a neighboring park.
Another win for the city. Winnecke said all along this project would start in the first quarter of the year. Never said what year. So he was right again.
Look at it this way, that’s not the first hole our fair city has dumped money in.