The agenda of the Evansville Redevelopmemt Commission was just posted with the intention to assign the and extend for the 5th time the agreement between City Centre Properties and the ERC. Assignment of the agreement will be to McCurdy Development LLC and an extension of a to be determined length will be voted on today.
Randal Lloyd of McCurdy Development began his presentation by introducing himself and asking for the agreement to be assigned to him and extended to February 29th, 2012. Sara Miller asked some questions regarding the details of the financing being proposed and received no answers.
Mr. Lloyd stated that his group that includes Ben Kunkel of the Kunkel Group needs to do some VETTING of their own to see if the project is worth doing and will not do that unless assignment is made. He furthermore offered no details about the financing and asked the ERC to take a “leap of faith”. Lloyd furthermore stated that he thinks that there may be more incentives somewhere without identifying them.
The ERC consented that they are not prepared to let City Centre Properties LLC and Mr. Steve Scott off the hook for liabilities until someone else moves forward with the project. Ms. Miller of the ERC was diligent with her questioning and was getting no answers to satisfy her.
The question came up about why this action can’t wait until after January 1st when a new ERC is in charge and attorney Brad Salmon answered that McCurdy Development has 45 days to get this financed. Local Attorney Marco DeLucio spoke and stated that there is no written proposal to them to approve and that by approving this extension and assignment that the ERC would be locking the Winnecke Administration into an undefined agreement with an unknown entity unnecessarily. When asked by ERC President Bob Goldman who he was representing Mr. DeLucio responded that he is representing himself.
The issue of the mortgage on the property that is held by 5th 3rd Bank came up as an important component to secure to be able to go forward. Mr. Lloyd needs the consent of the ERC to secure that note for 5th 3rd and if he can’t then the responsibility for the situation falls back to Steve Scott and City Centre Properties LLC?
A series of people including incoming City Council members Al Lindsey and Stephanie Brinkerhoff-Riley spoke before the ERC and expressed opposition to this assignment leap of faith scheme.
The ERC voted on the resolution and tied at 2 – 2 which is not sufficient to move forward.
Check back as this is a developing story.
Mr. Lloyd wants the ERC contract assigned to him before he determines if the project is worth doing?? Sounds silly enough for our clueless ERC to approve it.
Finally, someone stepts up and speaks about how The Kunkel Group is very sneaky. Great job incoming City Council members Al Lindsey and Stephanie Brinkerhoff-Riley on standing up and speaking out. I can’t wait to see what happens when you 2 and others represent the citizens of the city of Evansville on the city council beginning January 1, 2012.
Ditto and Mr. DeLucio’s comments are spot on. This Weinzapfel ERC has been a 4 year joke mishandling the McCurdy project at every step. Mr. Winnecke’s first action should be to appoint new and competent members. It was impressive that Councilman and City Controller to be Russ Lloyd Jr. was also there to keep an eye on the last act of the Weinzapfel ERC.
Editors: Thanks for including the bit about Mr. Lindsey & Ms. Brinkerhoff-Riley. The C&P failed to mention that these two incoming officials spoke on behalf of their constituents. Thanks, also, to them being there!
Agreed. We have two great leaders coming on board the Evansville CC next week. I’m very excited about both of them!
One question: if this assignment and extension had been approved, what would have become of the $ 800,000 in grants already received by CCP ? Does that mean Mr. Lloyd would have done the project WITHOUT those grants, and the ledger wiped clean for CCP ? Was CCP going to stroke Mr. Lloyd a check for 800 large ? Amazing how these details get glossed over ?
BG, great points. The $800,000 is never to be seen again as the LLC is only a legal shell. Mr. Dunn keeps his $600,000 for the Mayor’s must have $125,000 parking lot. This is a text book lesson in how not to run local government or any basic business transaction. A complete and total 4 year fiasco. Mr. Winnecke assembled a very impressive group of appointees so far and I expect he will finally take charge and responsibility for this complete FUBAR that he inherits.
agree with everything you posted, Mr. B, especially the FUBAR characterization of this project.
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