Proposed Patriot Park development denied zoning change
A mixed-use development planned for the old Silverstone property in Hobart may eventually be headed back to the drawing board after the City Council nixed the zone change over an apparent misunderstanding of the plans.
The Council during Wednesday night’s Council meeting voted 7-0 to deny on second reading Patriot Park, the proposed development for the 183-acre Silverstone property north of U.S. 30 and east of Mississippi Street, after it took it off the table last month. Initially tabled because of an amended mortgage due, Councilman Mark Kopil, D-1, asked City Planner Ross Pietrzak to compare the Patriot Park plan to a plan submitted for the property several years ago.
Comparing the two plans as best he could, Pietrzak said that Patriot Park has carved out 700,000 square feet of commercial space where Silverstone had planned for 300,000 square feet, with the mixture of industrial-to-other business jumping to 84% to 16% in Patriot Park to Silverstone’s 51% to 49%. An office condominium unit also was taken out, bringing the industrial and residential parts of the project closer together, he said.
And while Patriot Park had planned for 65 cottage homes on the property, there’s no clear number on multi-family or senior-living housing, Pietrzak said.
Project engineer Jeff Ban pointed out that he, property owner Dave Lasco and project developer Al Krygier have been working on Patriot Park for several years, stopping only when the Silverstone site was being considered by the RDA for a convention center in 2019. The 700,000 in square footage they put in the plan isn’t set in stone, but rather a guide that they can present to interested businesses, he said; without the zoning, they can’t get purchase agreements.
Indeed, Ban at the Dec. 7 meeting said they need the Planned-Use Development designation first before they can go further with design work.
“I’ve been doing this a long time, and (the Silverstone) plan sat idle for a number of reasons; people aren’t buying with that original plan in mind,” he said. “The Plan Commission approve it, and (the Council) approved it on first reading, so I’m not sure what happened between now and then.”
Krygier said he’s not sure where Patriot Park goes from here, but he thinks the Council did the city a disservice. The development potentially could bring $130 million to $150 million of new assessed valuation through office space, distribution, warehousing, storage, light manufacturing, general business use, cottage homes and multi-family residential within walking distance of potential employment opportunities, he said previously.
“The millions (the project could bring in) would’ve helped fix the Southlake Mall (property tax issue),” Krygier said. “This fits what Hobart needs, and if the taxpayers knew the finances behind, they would agree.
“We’ve already spent years on this, so we’ll just reallocate our funds in other states for now. But never in 30 years have I not been welcomed with open arms.”
Pam Broadaway, Director for the Maria Reiner Center, seemed to get what Krygier and Ban were putting down.
“Can somebody enlighten me as to why it was voted down? We need that money,” she said during public comment. “I certainly hope something can be done.”