The CIC and E. Wilson Bridge Rd: Could We Get Some Housing, Please?

Worthington citizens have been expressing for several years now a desire for the development of additional, varied housing in our community, compatible and harmonious with surrounding neighborhoods.  I support this, and I know we can do it.  To this point, an important decision about housing vs. commercial development is going to be made at a meeting this Friday morning (July 25, 2024), 8 a.m., 2nd floor of City Hall.

On the surface, the decision relates to how a small piece of land on East Wilson Bridge Road will be developed.  But underlying this immediate question is the primary question of how this decision, and others like it, is made—by whom, from what perspective, in whose interests, and with what accountability.  I’m concerned an unfortunate decision will be made this Friday, largely out of public sight, by unelected officials, missing an opportunity to develop an innovative housing enclave.  I hope I’m wrong.

In the interest of brevity, I provide below brief background information on the issue, and then, to get to the heart of the matter, I ask a summarizing question about the decision-making process.  Then, for those interested, I will lay out some of the details, history, and information links to help us try to make sense of it all.

Background:

We have in our city government apparatus something called the Community Improvement Corporation (CIC).  It’s run by a volunteer board, which includes many people from the real estate, development, and finance industries, with city staff and two city council members constituting a minority of board members.  The CIC’s stated purpose is “advancing, encouraging, and promoting the industrial, economic, commercial, and civic development of the community.”

The CIC, with ≈ $1,000,000 of public money (details at bottom of post), purchased 3.25 acres on East Wilson Bridge Road (EWBR) during 2018-2021.  These acquisitions were part of an effort to belatedly realize a portion of the Wilson Bridge Road Corridor Plan, which was written a full decade earlier in the aftermath of the Great Recession.  The CIC has now been trying to develop office space at this property for years even though the post-covid market for office space is upside down.  They have not succeeded.  Meanwhile, I have been encouraging innovative residential development.  This is what we need, it’s what the neighborhood residents want, and it’s what the market will support. 

Summarizing Question:

And yet, the CIC, rather than pivot to residential, is apparently poised to extend again the commercial Purchase Agreement originally signed in May of 2023.  What makes this situation confounding and a bit self-contradictory is that a number of CIC board members, both volunteer leadership and City Council members, have regularly advocated in other contexts for the development of housing.  Lots of it.  Including high-density apartments.  So why they persist in seeking commercial development where the economics are weak, and public support even weaker, when they have the unfettered ability to develop the housing they elsewhere support, is an inconsistency that I do not understand.

Perhaps CIC members will claim that their mandate is for commercial development alone.  I’ve heard this before.  But the inclusion of “civic development” in their mission statement certainly provides them with the ability to adapt to changing circumstances.  Perhaps Friday’s meeting will afford a clue, maybe an answer, to this apparent contradiction.  I hope so.

History and Context:

To reiterate, the CIC, with ≈ $1,000,000 of public money, purchased 3.25 acres on East Wilson Bridge Road (EWBR) during 2018-2021.  These acquisitions were part of an effort to belatedly realize a portion of the Wilson Bridge Road Corridor Plan, which was written a full decade earlier in the aftermath of the Great Recession.

Since then (2010-12), the underlying rationale of the Plan has been proven wrong and undermined by demographic and economic realities.  This, combined with changes in the physical makeup of the corridor itself (newly built houses, etc.), has led me to conclude that the Plan is outdated, inoperable, defunct, etc., and that it ought to be put on a shelf.  But, once a Plan is written and approved by the City, it tends to take on a life of its own.  I provide background on this issue, with critiques, in an earlier post: https://davidrobinsonblog.com/2022/04/ewbr-a-specific-issue-reflecting-big-choices/

So the CIC, based on a plan written in a different era, has nonetheless been determined to turn what had been low-density residential lots into a commercial development, embedded in what remains a residential neighborhood on and around EWBR.  When this plan first came before Council, I thought the fixation on commercial development was a mistake, not only because it was based on an outdated Plan, but because it’s not tuned in to new needs and opportunities in our community.  I thought that the site location, and the CIC’s full control, provided a perfect opportunity for the city to facilitate the development of an innovative housing concept.  The residents of the area thought so too.

And so when the CIC issued a Request For Proposals (RFP) in August of 2022, I lobbied that they accept residential proposals as well as commercial.  They ended up doing so, and as a result they received a total of six submissions, proposing a diverse range of outcomes.  Three were residential, including two affordable housing options (Homeport and WODA) and one market based, cottage court concept (Bob Webb).  Two proposals were commercial (Canini & Associates and Don Roberts Realty), and one was mixed use (Don Roberts Realty).

But here’s where things went sideways. The CIC selected the Don Roberts Realty proposal for the development of office buildings, signing a six month Purchase Agreement (PA) in May, 2023.  The CIC was quite generous in the terms of sale offered to the developer.  The CIC, by choosing the office building proposal, accepted an offer of just $640,000 (despite the fact that the CIC had already invested a total of $1,065,200 in the acquisition and site preparation). In addition, the PA allowed for partial purchase and development of the property if the developer requested (which, if this route was taken, would leave the CIC with a remainder parcel, all the more difficult to smartly develop).

In contrast to this office building proposal, Bob Webb offered $1,000,000 for acquisition of the entire property for the development of cottage court housing (see links below on the RFP, proposals, and cottage court housing).

Six months later, in November, 2023, the developer had not been able to pre-lease the office space, to his satisfaction, and had not executed the PA.  In response, the CIC provided a six month extension.  This too expired, unexecuted, in May, 2024.  The reason was the same—an inability to find tenants wanting to lease new office space on EWBR.  This is not surprising given the post-covid glut of office space.

At this Friday’s meeting, the CIC will decide whether they will offer yet another contract extension, or adapt and pivot to residential, or to a third concept.

I have learned that the CIC is now considering a twelve (12) month extension to the office space PA.

For the sake of the city, I urge them not to.  This action would have the effect of shutting down discussion about the property for a year, likely leaving us with an unseemly vacant lot, and foreclosing the possibility of acting now, not in the distant future, to build an innovative housing development.

Such a residential development on EWBR would not only provide homes and a community to those that move in, but would provide a means of testing whether a certain type of housing development is desirable and possible on a modest-sized parcel.  I have advocated for years that a sensible housing policy in Worthington ought to be based on building modest-sized developments, harmonious with surrounding neighborhoods in scale and impact.  This is a golden opportunity to do so, now.

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Additional Information:

You can access the city’s CIC web page here: https://businessworthington.org/141/What-is-the-Community-Improvement-Corpor

You can see the CIC’s RFP for the EWBR property here (https://www.worthington.org/Bids.aspx?BidID=61), and the six proposals received here (https://businessworthington.org/143/Worthington-CIC-Owned-Properties).

The Bob Webb cottage court proposal, which I find particularly appealing, can be viewed here: https://businessworthington.org/DocumentCenter/View/353/Bob-Webb-Homes—Proposal-for-E-Wilson-Bridge-Redevelopment-Project?bidId=

I have written about cottage courts here, describing how this type of housing offers naturally affordable, community-building, and gentle-density housing: https://davidrobinsonblog.com/2019/04/cottage-courts-affordable-compatible-gentle-density-housing-in-worthington/

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I mentioned at the outset of this post that the issues surrounding the CIC-owned EWBR properties have broad implications for our city’s future.  Here’s how I see it, and here’s some of what I’ll attempt to address in future posts:

The big issues at hand:

• How is your city government making land-use decisions? Specifically, which people and decision-making bodies are making these decisions?  What are the roles of city staff, city council, boards and commissions, consultants, developers themselves, and, germane to this post, the Community Improvement Corporation (CIC)?  Accountability requires specificity.
• Whose interests are being served in and through varied land-use decisions? The residents of Worthington?  Developers and related financial interests?  The city government itself?  Regional interests?  Someone or something else?
• Has our city government normalized conflicts-of-interest in its development decision-making processes?  And, if so, to what effect?

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City Council transferred a total of $1,075,000 to the CIC from 2018 to 2021, for purposes of acquisition, demolition, and design work.  The CIC has spent approximately $1,065,000 to date for the EWBR project, as follows:

145 E. Wilson Bridge Rd. – Purchased in September 2018 for $212,000

127 E. Wilson Bridge Rd. – Purchased in February 2019 for $215,000

133 E. Wilson Bridge Rd. – Purchased in February 2021 for $220,000

139 E. Wilson Bridge Rd. – Purchased in February 2021 for $245,000

Survey work ($12,000)

Site planning ($10,500)

Demolition costs ($82,000)

Property taxes ($68,700)

Total: $1,065,200