06-13-2012 Council Agenda - Laserfiche WebLink

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515 Little Canada Road, Little Canada, MN 551 17 -1 600 (651) 766 -4029 / FAX: (651) 766 -4048 www.cnithe-eanada.mn.us MEMORANDUM TO: Mayor Blesener and Members of the City Council FROM: Joel Hanson, City Administrator DATE: June 8, 2012 RE: Marketing Viking Drive Property MAYOR 13!11 131cscner COUNCIL Rick Montour John Reis Michael McGraw Shelly Boss ADMINISTRATOR Joel R. Hanson A few meetings ago, we decided to hold off discussing the marketing of the Viking Drive property until all of the Council was present. I have also not received any updates from RJ Marco on their efforts. As a reminder, the site is about 41,000 square feet. Depending on the use, compliance with parking requirements could be challenging. A rough guess is we may generate about $10 a square foot for retail /office versus $15 plus for fast food on a sale basis. From staff's perspective, we seem to have two options. One would be to market the site in a patient manner and try to obtain some type of office use. This is what RJ Marco has been attempting without success. This might go on for quite some time before we found the right user. If this option is chosen, we could also try it to see what interest is generated and then modify our approach if we don't Like the response. The second choice would be to market the site to fast food operators as long as burgers are not involved. I believe this would generate us the highest return on the site, but it may not be the ideal use. A third option I did not propose is to market the site for general retail. I did not propose this because past discussions of the City Council did not seem enthusiastic toward this concept and there is other available space meeting this need. Staff would like some direction as to your objectives for the site and how you would like us to market it. (Marketing options could include a Request for Proposals, a sign on the site, direct mailings to developers /brokers representing the type of use we desire, etc.