Explanation
Background: Around the time Rogue Fitness planned to consolidate production and administrative operations at the former Timken Co. site southwest of Cleveland Avenue and 5th Avenue, City Council passed Ordinance No. 3097-2015 (the “Original TIF Ordinance”) on December 14, 2015 to establish a non-school tax increment financing (TIF) area pursuant to R.C. Section 5709.40(B) on the Timken Co. site and in the vicinity of the Milo-Grogan neighborhood (the “Milo-Grogan TIF”). The non-school portion of those service payments in lieu of taxes (the “Service Payments”) paid to the City for deposit into the Milo-Grogan TIF Fund created by the Original TIF Ordinance are to be used to finance public infrastructure improvements benefiting the Milo-Grogan TIF parcels in anticipation of new developments around the neighborhood. The Service Payments were previously authorized by Ordinance No. 1417-2021, passed on June 15, 2021 by City Council, to finance approximately $145,000 of now completed new public sidewalk and street tree installation along Reynolds Avenue east of Cleveland Avenue to support a new 192-unit multi-family project and the existing single family homes adjacent to it.
Now, Half Baked Holdings, LLC (the “Developer”) is redeveloping the former Kroger Bakery site on Cleveland Avenue (the “Site”) directly south of the Milo-Grogan TIF into a mixed-use development which the Developer expects to consist of approximately 40,300 square feet of office, 9,600 square feet of retail, 363 multi-family units, 401 garage parking spaces, and an urban green space (collectively, the “Project”). Pursuant to Ordinance No. 0508-2021 passed on March 8, 2021 by City Council, the City entered the southern manufacturing building on the Site, which is also the former Ford Motor Company Branch Assembly Plant, on the Columbus Register of Historic Properties.
To further support the preservation of the now vacant, historical Site, and repurposing it for the Project, this ordin...
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