$53M Chemical Building Rehab Clears Final City Hurdle
Date Posted: November 25, 2019
Posted In: Projects,
From St. Louis Post-Dispatch: A $53 million rehab of the Chemical Building, the century-old, 17-story red brick and terra cotta architectural gem that has sat vacant in the heart of downtown for over a decade, has won final signoff from the city.
The St. Louis Land Clearance for Redevelopment Authority gave the green light this week to local development incentives for the project, including 17 years of full property tax abatement, a decade of personal property tax abatement and a sales tax exemption on construction materials. Financing is expected to close at the beginning of the year and construction to begin soon thereafter, with completion scheduled for mid-2021.
Restoration St. Louis, led by Amy and Amrit Gill, announced in April that it intended to buy the building at 721 Olive Street from a New York firm whose plans for “micro-apartments” had stalled. The Gills plan to add a mix of 84 hotel rooms and 72 apartments to the historic structure designed by Henry Ives Cobb and connect it to their recently completed Hotel St. Louis next door.
While the St. Louis Board of Aldermen approved the incentive package in July, conflicting personalities and the large size of the incentive package led behind-the-scenes negotiations to boil into view over the summer.
The Gills’ plan called for extending the 20-year tax abatement district that had been approved for use on Hotel St. Louis to also cover the Chemical Building, providing the last 17 years of tax abatement for the new rehab project. That’s despite a move by the city in recent years to no longer abate 100% of new property taxes except in the weakest neighborhoods.