Jackson Free Press

Jackson Redevelopment Authority board members are questioning the first phase of the Old Capitol Green development while they wait on the developers to submit a proposal for JRA to help to finance a $27 million parking garage with adjoining commercial space.

The developers are seeking bonds from JRA to build the garage. Full Spectrum has additional funding sources such as Go Zone bonds to move forward on the commercial space, JRA attorney Zach Taylor told board members July 27. The parking garage would be located on Full Spectrum property between Hal & Mal's and an unused Greyhound bus station.

During JRA's June meeting, board members approved a motion for the developer to submit a term sheet that would outline an agreement between JRA and Full Spectrum on financing the project.

The board voted in June to give Full Spectrum 30 days to submit a term sheet, but has not yet received the document. Full Spectrum Developer Malcolm Shepherd said today that JRA should receive the term sheet by the end of the week.

During JRA's July 27 meeting, board members asked several questions about the feasibility of the project. The garage would have 800 spaces in total, and Full Spectrum has guaranteed that it will have 600 spaces leased from office workers and residents. Taylor said that the developers are counting on residents and office workers to fill the majority of those spaces.

Taylor said that once JRA receives the term sheet, he would have more specifics for the board.

"Once there is something that is specifically spelled out, and we have got the data they have provided, we will know that this is what they are committing to do and what is expected to happen," Taylor said, adding that he expects developers to address how they will fill the retail and restaurant space in their proposal.

JRA Executive Director Jason Brookins said he could not yet predict how soon the parking garage would begin to generate revenue. Full Spectrum has predicted that the parking spaces will generate $175,000 a month from month parkers and $800,000 to $950,000 from people visiting the restaurants and offices.

Shepherd said the parking garage is important to anchor the development.

"It's very important that the garage financing is put in place," he said. "It's a facility that would initially be owned by Full Spectrum and the Jackson Redevelopment Authority."

Shepherd told the Jackson Free Press last year that Full Spectrum had already invested more than $1 million on the project and has conducted several feasibility studies for residential, retail and office space.

Full Spectrum is currently leasing the proposed garage property from the Mississippi Department of Finance and Administration.

In a separate issue, the Stimley-Brown law firm filed a lawsuit against Full Spectrum South and its counterpart Full Spectrum New York on July 22 claiming that the developers owe a minimum of $40,250 in rent at their office building at 802 North St. in Jackson. Stimley-Brown is the landlord and is asking for permission to evict Full Spectrum.

Full Spectrum attorney Walter Weems said that the lawsuit does not have anything to do with the future development.

"The essence of the dispute revolves around the landlord's obligations to repay repairs under the lease," Weems said. "Over the last year Full Spectrum has made extensive repairs that were the landlord's obligation, and rent was withheld to pay for those."

Stimley-Brown representative Chad Brown was not immediately available for comment.

Previous Commentsshow

Hey Jay, We are still trying to follow up on these numbers and get more information about the garage's feasibility. Look for more info in Wednesday's JFP. I have checked my recording from Wednesday's JRA meeting and these are the numbers Taylor gave board members.

Lacey McLaughlin

Aug 1 2011

The way I read it, they would generate that $175,000/month from 600 spaces, at @$292 per month, which only makes your point more. The other 200 spaces I think are meant to generate the $800K-$950K over the course of the year, and it would seem they would need to have the 200 spaces for the daily users (as you can't park 2 cars in one spot). I don't have the time to do the research, but I'm sure there is some rule of thumb for urban parking (akin to hotel occupancy rates) that would either confirm or disprove these projections. Agreed, would be happy to be proved wrong, but these numbers seem way too optimistic. Urban planners, please weigh in here. (Or other parking garage owners.)

annyimiss

Aug 1 2011

CLARIFICATION: I just got off the phone with Zach and Malcolm Shepherd. Malcolm said that all the parking spaces should generate $1.7 million per year. Zach verified these numbers and we determined that I misheard my recording. Monthly projections show that the garage would generate $700,000 for the entire year from tenants and $975,000 from visitors. We are also requesting the feasibility report so we can have hard data on the numbers. Sorry for the confusion.

Lacey McLaughlin

Aug 2 2011

Would love to see the feasibility report, if and when you get it. Here is a relatively recent parking study done by Colliers Research. http://www.colliers.com/Markets/Seattle/xmldata/Colliers Parking Rate Survey 2010.pdf It would seem reasonable to me to use Little Rock from the list, one of the few southern cities included that is close to the same size as Jackson. The median rate for reserved monthly parking spaces in Little Rock is almost $70; I bumped it to $100 for good measure, given that the Old Capitol Green garage will be new and have the cachet of being a robotic lot (the $70 seemed comparable to the above comment regarding the Region's parking lot). That comes to $1200 per year (12 months X $100), and in order to generate the $700,000 for the entire year the garage would have to rent out almost 600 spaces, oddly enough (583.33). I say oddly enough because that is uncannily near the 600 spaces in the original article. That would leave 217 spaces free for transient and daily visitors, if again for good measure we allow them to use some of the reserved spaces that will be vacated by office workers at 5PM, rounding it off to about 400 spaces available, that would mean each of these spaces would need to generate almost $2500 per year (400 X $2438= $975,0000), which would mean each space would have to generate $6.68/day. Using the study as a reference point, if we categorize the Old Capitol Green parking garage availability as FAIR: (From Study: Parking Availability ) • Fair: parking garages are 60-80% full Mon-Fri and on weekends during special events. • Limited: parking garages are usually full Mon-Fri and on weekends during special events. • Abundant: parking garages are consistently less than 60% full. (US only) and use 70% as an average, that reduces the number of bought/rented parking spaces to 280 (70%x400) and that raises the income each space has to generate to $3482 ($975,000/280). That suggests that each space that has not been bought by a monthly parker (217 and including the approximately 183 spots we are assuming will be rented out a second time to a visitor (at night?)will need to generate a little more than $9.50 per day, every day. As a comparison, the median daily parking rate for Little Rock is $8.00, again according to the study. Be happy if someone would look at the study and check my math and assumptions, but once again have to say something is not adding up here, the projections seem way too optimistic. I'd say Old Capitol Green has a rosy tint when it comes to these projections. And if the city (and taxpayers) are going to be partners we definitely don't want the project to be "in the red". Lacey, would the JFP post the feasibility report online so we can look at it, and if need be crowd source the analysis, if the city and/or JRA can't do the numbers crunching?

annyimiss

Aug 2 2011