Downtown Development Authority

Image: City Attorney Tom Yeadon, courtesy City of East Lansing

Image: Planning Director Tim Dempsey speaks at City Council

Tonight at City Council, Planning Director Tim Dempsey told Council that the development company PDIG—with which the City is actively negotiating on what would be the largest development in City history, at the corner of Grand River Avenue and Abbot Road—is owned in part by minor children.

Tonight at City Council, Mayor Nathan Triplett spoke with disappointment about yesterday’s failed vote to authorize City Council to proceed without the need for further direct-voter-approval on developer DTN’s Park District proposal. But City Manager George Lahanas said he saw the vote as sending an important reminder or message to City Council and the City planning staff.

Image above: Plan rendering provided by DTN, looking west across Abbot Road from above City Hall toward Valley Court Park. The largest building is a planned 7-story parking ramp with a 10-story building wrapped around it. (This does not show the entire Park District area plan.)

What would a “yes” vote on the parking lot sales ballot question mean to East Lansing residents in terms of changes to our city’s debt and our city’s real estate tax revenue? That’s a question on the minds of many East Lansing residents as they go to the polls.

An important question concerning the Park District proposals working their way through the City's Board and Commissions concerns who the tenants will be. The five buildings proposed by the Park District Investment Group and DTN Management Company would add approximately 600 beds of rental housing to an area between Valley Court Park and Abbot Rd. The demographic profile of this dense new residential community is likely to have a profound effect on how the downtown evolves over the coming years.

Council is hastening to vote to extend the Tax Increment Financing (TIF) plan on the Marriott University Place property as much as 30 more years at a 100% level of tax capture, bringing the TIF plan at this location to a record-setting 60 years. The current 30-year plan is not set to expire until December, 2016, but City staff fear that if Council waits to extend it, new rules at the State level will restrict what they can do in terms of TIF at this location.

Six new works of art that will double as bicycle racks are to be celebrated at an East Lansing ribbon-cutting event next week. Ami Van Antwerp, Communications Coordinator for the City, estimates that the $20,000 project will net “at least 10 new [bicycle] parking spaces” downtown. According to Van Antwerp, “There are a couple of situations where we are replacing deteriorating hoops with the new artistic bike racks.”