Care Source will build on site of former school building in downtown Dayton (below).
CareSource will build offices on site of former school building.
A Dayton board approved CareSource’s plans for a new six-story office tower that will bring hundreds of new employees to a now-vacant former school site.
CareSource intends to construct a building on the vacant site of the former Patterson Co-op High School in the 100 block of East First Street.
The building — which will have a similar appearance and design of CareSource’s headquarters at North Main and Monument streets — will be able to house about 800 employees, including hundreds of new hires.
City staff said the project will help connect the main commercial spine of downtown with existing and planned residential developments to the east and would improve and further solidify CareSource’s commitment to the center city.
“For me, it’s pretty exciting to think about the way this building will bridge the Main Street core area, the commercial area and then the more residential area to the east there,” said Tony Kroeger, Dayton city planner.
CareSource’s plans this week received the blessing of the Dayton Board of Zoning Appeals, with some conditions.
The plans required and were granted zoning variances for pedestrian-oriented design standards, including window orientation and placement, parking along the frontage and multi-tenant occupancy.
Work at the site is expected to begin in late March, and the new tower should be completed in spring 2019, according to a CareSource spokesperson.
The front of the structure — called CareSource Center City — will face First Street and will primarily feature a wall of windows, similar to the nonprofit’s headquarters.
This will be the first new office tower constructed downtown since CareSource built its headquarters. Ground broke on that project in 2007.
The new office tower will connect the Main Street business corridor with the residential neighborhood to the east, which includes Cooper Place, Cooper Lofts, Patterson Place, the Ice Lofts and the Litehouse homes, city officials said.
The Water Street District is also close by, and the district’s developers are adding 133 new apartments in the former Delco building.
The new building will be six stories instead of seven, which was initially proposed.
But CareSource this week closed on the office building and attached garage at 220 Monument Ave. called Ballpark Village. CareSource leased most of the building, but its purchase and renovation of the structure will add office spaces, which reduces the nonprofit’s space needs for its new tower.
The Board of Zoning appeals approved the variances requested, and members praise the design and appearance of the tower.
“I think confined to the zoning code, I think we’d have a rectangular, boring building, but instead we have something that has a lot of visual interest to it and sits well on the site,” said Mary Beth Caudill, a board member.