YOUR BUSINESS AUTHORITY
Springfield, MO
YOUR BUSINESS AUTHORITY
Springfield, MO
SPRINGFIELD, AUG. 11—Dalmark Development Group tackled Springfield’s white elephant – and it did it a month ahead of schedule.
The Kansas City-based company wrapped construction on downtown Springfield’s Heer’s building with a ribbon cutting Aug. 11, just 14 months after Straub Construction Cos. interior demolition began on the $15.8 million project.
Residents got a peak inside even sooner, when about a dozen moved in Aug. 7.
Originally slated for completion in September, in time for the building’s centennial celebration, Dalmark President Jim Nichols had made it known he wanted to finish up in August. The building was issued its temporary certificate of occupancy July 30.
“Is it 100 percent done? No, but it’s nearly there,” Nichols said. “There will be people in here for the next three of four weeks touching up paint and doing things like installing TVs in the common rooms.”
Some 20 years after the Heer’s department store closed, local officials celebrated the redevelopment into 80 apartments and the announcement of the building’s first commercial tenant – health care software firm IntrinsiQ LLC. A division of Fortune 16 company AmerisourceBergen Corp. (NYSE: ABC), the firm planned to move in to 17,700 square feet of commercial space on the first floor around Nov. 1, but construction work still is underway.
Once complete, IntrinsiQ would consolidate its existing Springfield office – on Enterprise Avenue north of Sunshine Street – as well as facilities in New Jersey, Massachusetts and Colorado into the downtown building. About 70 Springfield employees would relocate to the new space leased for undisclosed terms. It is yet unknown if employees from other states would relocate.
The multimillion dollar project was funded through a combination of property tax abatements on new improvements, federal historic preservation tax credits and a $750,000 small-business loan through the city. Through the National Parks Service, Heer’s Luxury Living also secured federal credits to pay an estimated $11.7 million in expenses and tax-credit sales generated roughly $5.6 million to support the redevelopment plan.
Three previous developers made a go at renovating the historic building – local businessman Warren Davis in 1995, Columbia’s Vaughn Prost in 2004 and St. Louisan Kevin McGowan in 2007 – but all failed. In early 2013, Heer’s Luxury Living purchased the building from real estate investment group E and J HIDC LLC, which had bought the building that year at a foreclosure auction for $960,000.
During the October 12 People You Need to Know live interview breakfast, Nichols said the building now has around 50 units occupied, or 62.5 percent.
Springfield Business Journal’s annual Day in the Life feature is back, this time taking you into the day of a health care leader, school district superintendent and brewery owner.