Convention center garage plan advances

OKC City Council will have final say

Oklahoma City has assembled an unorthodox package to finance MAPS 3 convention center parking, including a $5 million interest-free loan from the state’s largest electric utility.

An advisory board gave the proposal a major lift Thursday, recommending the city council redirect $9 million from MAPS 3 to build a parking garage.

The city must build parking to finalize a deal with Omni Hotels for a 600-room headquarters hotel that will be a companion piece to the convention center, due to open in 2020.

The arrangement includes acquisition of OG&E’s data center at SW 3 Street and Broadway Avenue.

In OG&E’s familiar “gold” building near Chesapeake Energy Arena, the data center will be relocated and the site cleared for garage construction.

As part of the financing, OG&E will loan the city $5 million, to be repaid interest-free over 20 years.

Expected to cost $35.2 million a year ago, the garage is now estimated to cost $40 million.

The difference is in an increase, roughly equal to the loan amount, in the price for OG&E’s property.

To complete the financing, the city’s parking authority will issue $26 million in debt and the city will shift $9 million to the garage from MAPS 3.

The 11-member MAPS 3 Citizens Advisory Board agreed on a voice vote to redirect the MAPS 3 funds and sent the proposal to the city council.

The city council takes up the proposal Dec. 5.

City Manager Jim Couch acknowledged the garage site is expensive but said there are synergies in the ability to provide parking for the convention center, hotel, park, arena and MAPS 3 streetcar.

He said securing the $9 million addresses “a gap that needs to be filled” to make the garage viable.

Advisory board member Bob Nelon had resisted a proposal to divert $10 million from MAPS 3 to the parking garage when the idea was first proposed in September 2016.

But with convention center designs nearing completion and construction underway on the MAPS 3 park, the MAPS 3 budget picture has shaped up and risk has receded, Nelon said.

He said residents who voted in favor of MAPS 3 rightly expect to have somewhere to park.

“I don’t think it’s inconsistent with the public expectation … to accommodate all the people we hope take advantage of all of these MAPS projects,” Nelon said.

“It is a bit of a Rubik’s Cube,” he said. “We’ve got to move one piece to get another piece to move. And I think that’s where we are in this situation.”

The Citizens Advisory Board agreed to an additional $400,000 fee for the convention center architect.

With the city council’s go-ahead, architects will design an enclosed skyway for convention center visitors who park in the new garage. The price tag could run to $5 million.

A second skyway between the convention center and hotel is an “alternate,” or add-on, to the base construction bid and is estimated to cost $2 million.

Convention center construction bids tentatively are scheduled to be opened in March.

Also Thursday

The Citizens Advisory Board also agreed to allocate $22,000 for exercise equipment for the first MAPS 3 senior health and wellness center after hearing from several center patrons who described how joining the center changed their lives.

The center opened in April and has attracted more than 4.000 members, said Bill Fleming, chairman on the city’s nonprofit operating partner.