In what could be called dueling State of the City addresses, Mayor Rick Proctor and City Council President Samson Steinman both delivered remarks at tonight’s annual reorganization meeting, assessing the city’s position as it enters a new year.
Tag Archives: State of the City
State of the City 2011
In this first State of the City address, Mayor Rick Proctor pledged to continue redevelopment focused on the arts, remove barriers to stimulate revitalization and recruit new business and redevelopment projects while beginning to actively market the city.
State of the City 2010
Mayor James Kennedy focused almost exclusively on the arts during his State of City remarks at Tuesday night’s City Council meeting.
State of the City 2009
Though I was unable to attend Monday’s City Council meeting, I did get a copy of Mayor James Kennedy’s State of the City address. The mayor is among a long list of officials looking for help from the feds.
“I retain optimism that this slowdown will only be temporary and the incoming administration of President-Elect Obama will provide long-overdue federal funds to invest in our roads, sewers, parks and other vital elements of our infrastructure,” Kennedy said. “Unlike other municipalities, Rahway has many projects that are already approved by the authorizing boards and agencies. Our improvements and investments will enhance our redevelopment opportunities. So that the ‘shovels can hit the ground’ as soon as the economy rebounds and our continuing redevelopment efforts will restart in a period of months instead of years,” he said.
Among the projects Kennedy cited as “ready to begin” are the 88-unit Renaissance at Rahway and 116-unit Station Place. The Savoy, he said, will “restart construction when additional financing is obtained.” (Photo at left)
As for other redevelopment-related highlights in his remarks, the mayor reviewed the various ongoing projects that you’ve read about here before:
— New ratables increased the tax base by $30 million for the nine-month period in 2008. A full year on the books is expected to create $42 million in 2009. A little perspective: ratables increased by about $30,000,000; the city’s total valuation is about $1,500,000,000 ($1.5 billion). The added ratables — mainly attributed to Carriage City Plaza, Luciano’s and Riverwalk — generated about $900,000 in additional tax revenues for the city.
— In addition to the planned 1,000-seat amphitheater at the former Hamilton Laundry site, and development of the former Bell Telephone building into a performing arts space and black box theatre, the former Elizabethtown Gas building is expected to be purchased and house a “first-rate art school as well as a co-op gallery venue.”
— “The 40,000 square feet of condominium space above the library was sold last year, and will be conv
erted into office space sometime this year.” The library opened in 2004 with the idea of eventually selling the top two floors for office space. No word on whether the sale netted the $3.5 million that was expected at the time to help offset the cost of the $7.4-million facility. [UPDATE: SDI Technologies already paid $3.2 million to the city for this project, according to City Administrator Peter Pelissier.]
— The city is “exploring a partnership with the Parking Authority to construct a 300- to 500-space parking deck on Lot B, to complement the proposed Westbury housing/retail development next door.” We wrote about this study in August but there was never any mention of the number of spaces. Originally, The Westbury was planned with a five-story, 324-space parking facility.
For some historical perspective, there are a few paragraphs about the mayor’s 2005 State of the City address here.
On tap for 2008: Park Square, Sky View
Nothing Earth-shattering in the mayor’s State of the City address last night. The new year should bring with it the completion of Park Square and Sky View at Carriage City Plaza, which includes a Hotel Indigo. Mayor James Kennedy pledged that downtown redevelopment efforts would continue to see progress this year, despite a downturn in the national economy as a result of the subprime mortgage crisis.
The largest portion of the mayor’s nine-minute remarks focused on a new billing method for sewage. He expects the city’s assessment from the Rahway Valley Sewerage Authority (RVSA) to increase from $3.6 million in Fiscal Year 2007 to $6.1 million in FY 2010, or almost 70 percent in the next three years.
Speaking of the subprime mortgage mess, what effect has it had on Rahway’s plans? I happened to pose that question to City Administrator and Redevelopment Director Peter Pelissier just last month, after reading about Asbury Park’s problems, and one Hoboken developer switching condo projects to rentals because of the housing market.
Pelissier said the city hasn’t been adversely affected by the real estate market — in terms of redevelopment — and rattled off an update on a number of projects:
* Park Square (rentals) has made plans to take out permits for the second building, which will face Main Street.
* Dornoch I (Main and Monroe streets) has taken out permits for The Savoy (36 units for purchase with 7,000 square feet of retail).
* Station Place (Five stories, with 80 units and 132 parking spaces, on Campbell Street between Elm and Cherry, for purchase) is still in the process of acquiring properties and relocating the main tenant, A&M Tool Co.
* Wheatena (Elizabeth and West Grand avenues) has requested assistance on the acquisition of properties for its 200-unit project (for purchase).
* Renaissance at Rahway, 72 units with underground parking, also requested assistance of the Redevelopment Agency to acquire the remaining three properties necessary to control the site (Triangle Inn area on Monroe Street). Five of the eight properties necessary are under contract.
* The Town Center project in the City Hall area is still being discussed, and the potential developer is negotiating with retailers as well as the property owners on the site. “As you can imagine this project is complex and will take some time to coordinate all the components of a project this size,” Pelissier said.
If a developer wanted to convert a condo project to rentals, as in some towns, the developer would have to come before the Redevelopment Agency again for approval, he said.
“Each week developers contact the mayor or myself inquiring as to the possibilities of developing in Rahway,” Pelissier said. “Also take a look around the downtown area, properties are being improved in the Arts District as well as throughout the downtown. This points out the small investor continues to believe in the future of Rahway as well as the larger developers.”
The mayor also mentioned that City Council has authorized demolition of the Hamilton Laundry site. I’ll have an update and potential timeline on that later this week.