Woodruff developers draw up $13M plans

“The wait is over.”

For months, a message written in paint by an unknown author high atop the 10-story Woodruff building downtown rings true for those interested in learning the plans new owners have in store for the century-old structure.

The owners of “Springfield’s original skyscraper,” are planning a $13 million renovation to transform the vacant Woodruff into a 96-unit apartment complex dubbed Sky Eleven.

Tim Roth, a commercial real estate adviser and Woodruff co-owner, said the owners are pursuing financing through the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, and plans are contingent upon receiving Chapter 353 tax abatement. Roth and business partner/developer Matt Miller of Matt Miller Co. and The Vecino Group LLC, purchased the 10-story downtown property in November through Woodruff Historic Building LLC.

He said Woodruff Historic Building LLC has received what amounts to preliminary approval for financing because HUD has asked the developers to submit a firm application for funding after reviewing the development plans.

The developers were scheduled to address Springfield’s Planning & Zoning Commission on April 4 to request blighted status for the property.

“It is zoned center city, and that allows for apartments. The reason we are going to Planning & Zoning is the building has to be declared blighted to get the 353 abatement, and that’s part of the process,” Roth said. “We feel like there is a demand downtown. There is high occupancy in other properties existing downtown, and we are going to have amenities with our property.”

Plans for Sky Eleven – a name based on the year the building opened, 1911, as the city’s first skyscraper, according to Roth – would have an exterior pool on the north side of the property, doorman service, a theater room, fitness area, restaurant and office space on the first floor. Roth said the complex would feature studio, one-, two- and three-bedroom apartments.

“It will be metropolitan-style apartments,” Roth said, noting construction would begin in October and take a year to complete.

He said there have been several hurdles with the project, because it is dependent on local tax abatement, state historical tax credits and federal financing.

The Woodruff developers also took out two city loans to help get initial plans off the ground. One of the loans was a $735,000 Small Business Development Loan to help cover the building’s acquisition, Springfield Economic Development Director Mary Lilly Smith said. The other was a brownfield loan for $225,000 to help fund the removal of asbestos and lead paint.

If P&Z commissioners approved the plans, the proposal would move to a public hearing at the April 22 City Council meeting. A second reading and vote could come as early as May 6, said Matt Schaefer, a Springfield senior planner.

Schaefer said city staff recommends approval of the redevelopment plan because the project would redevelop a property with a number of blighted conditions and conforms with the city’s comprehensive plan for center city.

“It’s rehabilitating a blighted structure downtown, so it is going to benefit center city,” Schaefer said.

According to a blight report submitted with the redevelopment plan, blighted conditions include inadequate and physical deterioration, functional and economic obsolescence and outmoded design.

Should council approve the redevelopment plan, the developers would receive $1.1 million during the next 25 years in property tax abatements. Property taxes would remain at the 2012 level for 10 years and rate increases would be abated by 50 percent for the following 15 years. According to a tax impact study submitted with the redevelopment plan, without redevelopment, property taxes would amount to $337,088 during that period, but with the improvements and the abatement plan in place, the developers would pay $708,397 during that time.

According to redevelopment plans on file with the city, roughly 70,000 square feet of the nearly 103,000-square-foot building is designed as rate lease space, and 5,486 square feet is set aside for commercial use split into three suites, the smallest of which – 870 square feet – is designated for a coffee shop. Rental rates would range between $585 and $1,300 per month.

Roth and Miller have tabbed general contractor Build LLC and architecture/design firm Buxton Kubik Dodd Creative for the building remodel. Miller’s Vecino Group, which has undertaken a $9 million renovation to the Landmark Building across the street to the north, is also part of the redevelopment team.

The announcement by Roth and Miller comes just ahead of a scheduled April 22 foreclosure sale of the long-vacant Heer’s Tower. Heer’s developer Kevin McGowan failed to secure financing for redevelopment of the historic building through HUD before he backed away from the project in late 2010.

John T. Woodruff developed the Woodruff building in 1910, leading a prolific period in Springfield’s history where several of its most notable concrete structures rose, according to a column by architect Allen Casey published in a 2006 edition of Springfield Business Journal.

In 1914, the seven-story Heer’s building, the five-story Holland Building and the four-story McDaniel Building, which later expanded to six floors, were all completed.

In 1915, the 10-story Landers Building was erected on Park Central Square next to the Heer’s before a 22-year lull where no buildings taller than six stories were built in the city.