Company Bids $150K for McGuffey-Garland Site
YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio -- Highway Contracting LLC, which lists its mailing address in Poland, was the successful bidder for the McGuffey Mall and Garland Plaza properties at the close of an online auction Wednesday.
Highway Contracting submitted a $150,000 bid for the two East Side buildings, located at 761 and 795 N. Garland Ave., confirmed Joe Bell, director of corporate communications for the Cafaro Co., which owns the property. Highway Excavating’s bid was the highest of three submitted for the site at the conclusion of the three-day online auction. The minimum bid for the two buildings was $100,000.
The two buildings combined have 238,193 square feet of space and 229,181 rentable square footage, with a combined market value of in excess of $500,000, according to the Mahoning County auditor’s website. Just over 10% of the space is leased by K&P Family Sportswear & Beauty Supplies, the property’s sole tenant.
“We wish them well. We think they got a good value for their money,” Bell said.
A woman answering the telephone at Highway Contracting LLC told The Business Journal her company would have no comment on its plans for the retail and commercial complex. Records on file at the Better Business Bureau of the Mahoning Valley list the company's office is at 860 Boardman-Canfield Road in Boardman.
According to the company’s website, Highway Contracting specializes in excavation, demolition and site work. Since 2000, the family-owned business has served public, private and state clients that need help with sewer removal and excavation, site excavation, sewer contracting, building demolition, utility excavation, and storm culvert and watering demolition.
All but one of the four projects listed on the website involved building demolitions and site work. These include a $1.5 million project for Winner International Co., Sharon, Pa., to demolish a five-story building and prepare the site for an office complex. Another project was a $650,000 "major demolition and site work" for construction of a Bottom Dollar Foods story. Actual locations of the projects were not specified.
Key staff are identified as civil engineer David Bonamase and project manager Edward Bonamase.
The initial building that came to be known as the McGuffey Mall was built in 1954 and Garland Plaza constructed in 1960, Bell said. In 1972 additions were made to McGuffey to make it “a true interior mall” with a concourse inside.
The transaction should close within 30 days, the Cafaro spokesman said.
Through the years, tenants at the McGuffey/Garland site included banks, supermarkets, a bowling alley, the U.S. Postal Service, the most recent tenant to vacate the mall building, in 2011, and, perhaps most famously, the Mahoning County Department of Job and Family Services.
The legal battle over the county’s decision to relocate Job and Family Services to Oakhill Renaissance Place from the Garland Plaza sparked a bitter legal battle between the Cafaro Co. and the county, as well as charges of misconduct by county officials who opposed the 2007 move and corruption charges against public officials members of the Cafaro family. The charges were later dropped.
EDITOR'S NOTE: This story has been corrected to clarify where Highway Contracting Inc.'s offices are located.
Copyright 2013 The Business Journal, Youngstown, Ohio.
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