The former Save-A-Lot location at 4145 Apple StreetNick SwartsellAn effort to establish a co-op grocery store in Northside won’t land at its long-identified first choice site after a vote by the Apple Street Market board yesterday.
Originally, organizers wanted to place the co-op market in a former Save-A-Lot building at 4145 Apple Street in the neighborhood. But the group hit a number of funding snags.
Northside community development corporation NEST received more than $500,000 from the City of Cincinnati in late 2017 to purchase the former Save A Lot that has been floated as the market’s future home since the low-cost grocer pulled out of the building in 2013.
As part of that funding agreement, the property must be in development on a project at the site within 24 months. Organizers with Apple Street played a big role in lobbying the city for that money under the assumption the site would be used for the grocery.
At first, it seemed as though Apple Street was making strides toward opening in the market with NEST serving as the owners of the building. Then, a number of cards fell out of Apple Street’s financing deck.
At a February emergency meeting in South Cumminsville, members of the Apple Street Market board told more than 70 of the project’s 1,279 shareholders that a large chunk of the project’s financing had fallen apart just before implementation.
In late January, the Columbus-based Finance Fund withdrew $900,000 in seed financing from the project because Apple Street had not yet raised enough operating capital. But that was just the start of the bad news.
The market was supposed to close on New Market Tax Credits worth $1.5 million in financing for development costs. But PNC, the investor in those credits, withdrew from many of its 2019 new market projects due to devaluation in the credits caused by tax reforms passed by Congress in 2017.
“We’re in a totally new situation at this moment,” Barker said at the time. “Losing that tax allocation is a very big deal. Grocery stores in low- to moderate-income neighborhoods — while they can be very successful long-term — they need subsidy in the short term.”
The loss of funding came after the market spent $377,000 between June 2014 and January last year on expenses like paying three employees (including $130,000 to a general manager over that time); conducting outreach efforts, a market study and retail planning; paying for design and engineering costs; and paying membership dues to Associated Wholesale Grocers, a major cooperative food wholesaler.
The loss of funding from the tax credits toppled another domino. NEST said the situation forced its hand to release a request for qualifications for other developers interested in the building.
In early October, NEST tapped Philadelphia-based Pennrose, LLC to build housing on the Save-A-Lot site. NEST, Pennrose and Apple Street were in talks exploring the possibility of incorporating a grocery store into that development, but in a Facebook post today, organizers with the market said the Apple Street board voted to walk away from that possibility because it would not provide enough retail space or parking..
“We know this is a disappointing outcome, but opening a successful store that meets all of the community’s needs is our first priority,” the post reads. “Our supplier, AWG, is a strong partner, and they told us this mixed use project has too many red flags… We are thankful for the support we have already received from the community, and believe that continued support from groups like the Northside Business Association, the NCC, and NEST will also be key to finding a new location.”
Organizers say they will form a committee in the next few weeks to begin the search for a new location. Apple Street says information about an upcoming owner meeting and board elections will be released soon.
