Stambaugh, Ogilvie Projects Get Historic Tax Credits
YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio – Projects to redevelop downtown’s historic Stambaugh Building as a hotel and to convert the Ogilvie block in East Liverpool for use by the New Castle School of Trades are among initiatives in 13 communities receiving support this morning with the award of $37.7 million in tax credits.
Ohio Historic Preservation Tax Credits, awarded by the Ohio Development Services Agency, will assist private developers in rehabilitating 35 historic buildings in downtowns and neighborhoods across Ohio, the agency announced. The projects are expected to leverage nearly $250 million in private investments.
Among the projects receiving assistance is NYO Property Group’s proposed conversion of the nearly century-old Stambaugh Building into a full-service hotel with 120 rooms. The $25.5 million project received a $5 million tax credit, "the maximum amount allowed under the program and is the largest historic preservation tax credit awarded in the Mahoning Valley since the program began," states NYO Property Group in a news release that followed the ODSA's announcement.
In East Liverpool, New Castle School of Trades plans to invest $6.52 million to redevelop the former department store to house a new vocational training school. This project received a $1.3 million tax credit.
NYO principal Dominic Marchionda, who redeveloped the Erie Terminal Building as apartments and is developing the Wick Building for apartments and extended-stay use, told The Business Journal in early March 2013 about his plans to redevelop the building as a hotel.
“The need for a full-service hotel to serve the area is certainly no secret, and we are excited to be able to move this project forward with this award from the state," Marchionda said today in a prepared statement. "The attraction, the draw, to downtown is the beauty and quality of these old buildings and how accessible everything is by foot, letting people enjoy a day, evening or night partaking in all that our Wick Avenue cultural corridor, university campus, central business, entertainment and innovation district has to offer."
Marchionda cited entertainment venues and redevelopment efforts in the downtown, which he described as "this new Youngstown. "How livable it is, how enjoyable it is, how beautiful it is to be in downtown Youngstown," he said. "This project will be another chapter of what we think has the potential to one of the greatest comeback stories ever to be told. The location of the building, right in Federal Plaza, seeing that lit up in the next few years will be a statement for our town."
The Stambaugh Building was designed in 1907 by noted Detroit architect Albert Kahn (READ HISTORY). NYO worked with Paul Hagman of RBF CoLab Architecture and Design, a Youngstown design firm, to prepare the tax credit application and the hotel design. Today the sole tenant is Warehouse 50, a restaurant and bar that occupy a portion of the first floor.
NYO is a partnership with Marchionda and the Brooklyn-based Pan-Bros Associates. This partnership was established in 2012 “to acquire, stabilize, and redevelop the historic building stock in the downtown Youngstown and campus district,” states its website.
The $1.3 million tax credit awarded for the former Ogilvie Department and 5 & 10 Stores, once the largest retailer in downtown East Liverpool, will support New Castel School of Trades’ $6.52 million project to redevelop the building to house its vocational training.
The building, “completely vacant and deteriorated,” according to the state agency, housed various tenants after Ogilvie ceased operations in the late 1980s (READ HISTORY). The project, the first in East Liverpool and Columbiana County to access the Ohio Historic Preservation Tax Credit Program, is estimated to create more than 20 permanent and 12 part-time jobs.
According to a Cleveland State University study, $1 million in Ohio Historic Preservation Tax Credits generates $8 million in construction spending, $40 million in total economic activity and nearly 400 jobs from construction and operations.
“The Ohio Historic Preservation Tax Credit leads to investment in both small towns and big cities,” said David Goodman, director of the Ohio Development Services Agency. “These projects strengthen local communities and create construction jobs during the renovation and permanent jobs once the building reopens.”
Copyright 2014 The Business Journal, Youngstown, Ohio.
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