Development group tours Texarkana site
TEXARKANA — The group that helped plan the Hotel Grim’s redevelopment was back in Texarkana this week, this time to look at the former Ritchie Grocery building.
A team from the Council of Development Finance Agencies ended its two-day visit with some preliminary recommendations for David Peavy, owner of the downtown Arkansas-side building he has renamed 1894 City Market and plans to develop into a mixed residential, commercial and arts space.
Within about four weeks the group will deliver a formal report detailing possible funding sources for Peavy, program manager Emily Moser said.
On Wednesday, the three-person team toured the building and met with city officials, downtown development advocates and other local stakeholders, including Mayor Ruth Penney Bell and members of the city’s Board of Directors. The team shared its initial recommendations on Thursday.
They include working with Arkansas Capital Corp., a nonprofit lender with higher risk tolerance than for-profit banks; qualifying for low-income housing tax credits; seeking funds from the Arkansas Development Finance Authority’s tourism development loan program; and applying for grants from Preserve Arkansas, a statewide historic preservation advocate.
In 2015, the Council of Development Finance Agencies recommended a similarly diverse combination of financing mechanisms to help fund the redevelopment of the Hotel Grim. Work on the Grim renovation project is expected to begin in early 2018.
Peavy said the systematic approach was reassuring.
“When we see the downtown, we see like a mile-high cliff that has to be scaled. And I think from talking with you guys, you say, ‘ No, you’re just walking up stairs. There’s a bunch of steps here,’” he said.
“A lot of it is getting the community involved and getting them excited about it,” Council of Development Finance Agencies program coordinator Blake Williams said. “Looking at best-case scenario, when his building becomes completed and then the Grim on the other side of the state line becomes completed, hopefully that brings in a few more people who are permanently down here, and you’ll want to keep building off that momentum. So it is a step-based approach. The enthusiasm’s there, and you’re doing all the right planning things.”
The visit’s results were just what he wanted, Peavy said.
“I had two goals. One was if they could find some good ways of financing, that would be great. But to bring the community together pushing all in the same direction was my primary goal. I feel like that was accomplished.
“I am pleased that everyone is seeing what I’m seeing: that this will be a landmark building to have remodeled and have come back alive,” he said.
Council of Development Finance Agencies is a national association of public and private organizations “that provide or otherwise support economic development financing programs,” according to the group’s website.