By Heather Lusk
The Zionsville Economic Redevelopment Commission delayed a vote to sell Creekside Corporate Park for $6.1 million during a special meeting July 10. A separate committee will meet prior to the next scheduled RDC meeting July 24 to better understand the financial impact to the town.
Zionsville-based Rockland Development wants to purchase approximately 41 acres of developable land for $150,000 per acre. It would include 13 developable lots, excluding those occupied by LIDS and DK Pierce.
“I agree that we need to expedite and move forward as quickly as we can, but we also need a little bit more information on numbers,” RDC President Brad Johnson said.
“We’ve got to look at the revenue side of things,” RDC committee member Luke Phenicie said.
One sticking point is an option for the town to repurchase the property if the development requirements are not met. The RDC discussed whether the town would be able to afford an increased selling price.
“I like the buyback if it’s at cost,” RDC committee member Wade Achenbach said. “We’ve never wanted to be the developers, as we’ve said many times.”
Paul Kite, one of the principals of Rockland Development, said that with the purchase agreement it would develop at minimum one lot per year but was willing to commit to more aggressive building options.
Kite said Rockland is working with an investor who wants to own some of the buildings in the office park and outlined two possible scenarios.
“The plan is that we would either develop the lots on a speculative basis with an anchor or without an anchor tenant and build buildings,” he said. “The second scenario is we would contribute the land to a development partnership as equity for another developer that would want to build a building.”
The Town of Zionsville borrowed $3 million to purchase the land and has invested nearly $7.7 million in developing the office park, according to Wayne DeLong, director of planning and economic development for the Town of Zionsville.
