Mequon Foxtown project could receive $4.5 million from city

A Mequon development proposal that includes a craft brewery, restaurants, housing and offices could receive $4.5 million in city cash.

The Foxtown project would have an assumed value of $50 million once it’s completed in 2023, according to a new city report.

The city cash would be provided to Foxtown’s developers through the new property tax revenue generated by the project.

If approved by the Common Council, the 17-acre Foxtown development, located at 6209 and 6411 W. Mequon Road and 11050, 11124 and 11127 N. Industrial Drive, would obtain city financing help through the Town Center Tax Incremental Financing District.

That district includes Mequon Town Center, completed in 2016, and Spur 16, which is under construction. Both are

across Mequon Road from the Foxtown site.

Mequon Town Center and Spur 16 have a mix of apartments and commercial space, and both received city financing help.

Foxtown would redevelop what is now a blighted site, according to the city Department of Community Development report. The area is mainly a collection of underused warehouses and vacant lots.

Foxtown would be developed by Thomas Nieman, president of Mequon-based pet food maker Fromm Family Foods LLC; apartment developer P2 Development Co.; and homebuilder Lakeside Development Co.

Their plans include:

❚ Converting a 19th-century former brewery building, 6411 W. Mequon Road, into a 6,800-square-foot restaurant and beer hall known as Foxtown Brewery. That building once was home to the Opitz and Zimmermann Brewery and was later used for industrial purposes.

❚ Building the separate 13,100square-foot Fox Yard Brewery in a converted industrial building along the railroad tracks, east of Industrial Drive.

❚ Constructing four additional office and retail buildings, with a two-story building east of the restaurant, along Mequon Road, and a two-story building and a pair of three-story buildings in the middle of the site. Those threestory buildings would each include 11 apartments on the top floors.

❚ Developing a three-story, 96-unit luxury apartment building and 21 single-family homes on the site’s southern portion.

Under a proposed timeline, the Common Council could review a financing agreement with Foxtown’s developers by August.