Distillery, events center may be set for West Allis
Company seeking more time to complete purchase of building
Tom Daykin
A craft distillery with an events center could be coming to a former West Allis industrial building.
Kenosha-based Witico Development Corp. hopes to develop that project at a former Kearney and Trecker Co. building, 6771 W. National Ave. — next to a craft brewery that’s under development.
That’s according to documents filed with the West Allis Community Development Authority, which has been negotiating a possible sale of the city-owned property to Witico since last November.
Witico is seeking more time to complete its purchase of the building.
The company has added a co-developer to the project, Madison-based Alexander Co., according to a recent letter to the authority. That firm’s projects include affordable apartments for veterans at the historic Milwaukee Soldier’s Home near the Zablocki Veterans Affairs Medical Center.
Also, another co-developer and “key operator” in the proposed project is an existing distillery operator which would lease most of the 40,000-square-foot building, according to the letter from Landon Thomas, Witico development manager.
Thomas declined to name the distillery.
He told the Journal Sentinel that the development would include an events venue.
“There is a significant focus on hospitality which generates a regional draw to the already growing residential community in West Allis,” Thomas said.
The letter from Thomas said Witico has hired a consultant and a vacuum glass manufacturer to apply for a U.S. Department of Energy grant to help finance the historic restoration of the building’s signature steel sash windows.
“This significant grant to a project logistical crux has been a key feature to the nature of this extension request as it greatly influences timeline, design and financial structures,” Thomas wrote in the letter.
Potential financing sources include equity investors, a commercial lender, state and federal historic preservation tax credits and federal New Markets Tax Credits.
The New Markets credits are provided for commercial developments in census tracts that have higher unemployment and poverty rates.
A timeline provided by Witico said the company plans to complete its purchase of the property in February and begin renovations next spring.
Other planned milestones include an Plan Commission design review in December and a development agreement review by the Common Council in January.
The proposed distillery’s combination with a major hospitality component is a model pursued by similar businesses, including the new Central Standard Craft Distillery Co. in downtown Milwaukee.
This is the second recent proposal for the building.
In 2019, Chicago-based Baum Revision Group proposed an events center combined with either a craft brewery or coffee shop.
But those plans fell through for the building, which has been vacant for over a decade.
Meanwhile, just east of the property, Ope! Brewing Co. is being developed in the former Perfect Screw Products Corp. building, 6751 W. National Ave.
Other nearby projects include Granite Hills Hospital, which just opened at 1706 S. 68th St., and The West apartments and additional apartments and commercial space that Mandel Group Inc. is developing near the West Allis Farmers Market.
The proposed distillery would redevelop a building that was constructed in 1918, with additions in 1930, 1937 and 1938, according to the Wisconsin Historical Society.
Kearney and Trecker operated there until 1975. It was later used by Milwaukee Ductile Iron Co.