The Covington Central Riverfront site now has approval for a mixed-use development that will include 7,700 square feet of retail space and 257 apartments.
At its meeting on Tuesday, the Covington City Commission approved a development agreement with CCR-MN Developers, LLC., for a mixed-use development on part of the site that formerly housed the IRS complex.
“Thank you for investing in our city,” Commissioner Ron Washington told Ryan Silverman and Tim Burgoyne of Silverman & Co., a development company involved with the project.
The approved areas include the M and N blocks, which run along Washington Street between 3rd and 4th Streets. The commission first heard the proposal for the development agreement at last week’s meeting, where Economic Development Director Tom West laid out the project’s plans. Discussion about the project among the commissioners at that meeting was slim, but the few comments that were made were positive.
CCR-MN Developers was specifically formed for this project and consists of several companies: development company Silverman & Co., Messer Construction, and architectural firm KZF Design. Silverman & Co. is behind several retail and office developments in Blue Ash and is spearheading a mixed-used development in Deerfield, Ohio, called The District at Deerfield.
This development agreement is the second with a private developer at the CCR site after Drees Homes, which secured a development agreement for the site’s B block in March. This year also saw a multi-million dollar injection of state money into the site for the establishment of the Northern Kentucky Center of Biomedical Excellence, which will see the relocation of NKU’s Chase College of Law and the Highland Heights branch of the University of Kentucky’s College of Medicine to the riverfront. The administration of those funds falls under the Northern Kentucky Port Authority.
The development will be mixed-use, meaning that it will contain both residential and business properties. It will feature about 7,700 square feet of retail space, 257 market-rate apartment units, and 194 parking spaces, some of which will be underground. West stated that the rough total investment into the site will be $67.2 million.
Plans for the development are still in very early stages, and West said at last week’s meeting that many of the renderings the developers submitted were simply models to give people an idea of the overall layout of the development. As such, they aren’t necessarily indicative of what the final product will look like.
The city will complete early infrastructural work on sewage lines, sidewalks, streets, utility infrastructure and public spaces as part of the development agreement. Moreover, the city plans not to use debt instruments or other municipal financing measures like industrial revenue bonds or tax increment financing districts. West estimated an annual 5.1% return on investment to the city, or about $228,000 per year.
One resident, Thurman Wenzl, spoke more generally about the riverfront development site and affordable housing at Tuesday’s meeting. Given the presence of market-rate housing at the new development, Wenzl encouraged the commission to consider residents of middle and low income when considering future development proposals on the remaining land plots. This was especially true, he argued, since many of the people who may eventually end up living nearby would be students, who may not be able to afford newly built apartments on a piece of prime real estate.
“So my specific suggestion is that [requests for proposals] for the rest of the IRS site should include incentives for $900 apartments,” Wenzel said.
He pitched the idea of drawing upon money allocated by the state for the biomedical center to aid in this, but Washington pointed out that that money was administered by the county, so he would need to take up his appeal there.
The discussion around the development coincided with a public hearing related to federal grant money, which included more discussion from Wenzl and others about the issue of affordable housing. As it related to the development site itself, discussion among the commissioners was limited.
“We’re very excited to have your development,” said Mayor Joe Meyer, “and the commitment you’ve brought to the table.”
The vote to affirm the development agreement was unanimous.
The next meeting of the Covington City Commission will take place on Tuesday, June 18, beginning at 6 p.m. at Covington City Hall on Pike Street.