A new, three-way partnership, consisting of a prominent Jewish philanthropy and two black-owned companies, has won exclusive development rights to city-owned property on a key corner in North Minneapolis. The group’s redevelopment plans call for office, retail and perhaps a speakeasy in the basement.
The city of Minneapolis will soon begin final negotiations with the joint venture that includes The Jay & Rose Phillips Family Foundation and two North Minneapolis companies: General contractor TRI-Construction and real estate development and co-working collaborative New Rules, a social benefit corporation founded by Target alum Chris Webley.
The Phillips are the descendants of the founders of Phillips Distilling, and include the late Pauline Phillips, better known as the syndicated advice columnist Dear Abby, and current congressional candidate and gelato magnate Dean Phillips.
The group beat out three other teams that responded to the city’s call for proposals for the site issued in January.
If negotiations go well, the trio will pay the city of Minneapolis $1 for the property at 927 W. Broadway Ave., a three-story brick building in North Minneapolis that dates back to 1901, and three vacant parcels to the south along Dupont Avenue that cover about half an acre. The deal also includes an option for 1001 W. Broadway, a dilapidated, 138-year-old building that will have to be demolished.
The plans call for a sweeping renovation of the building at 927 Broadway, and construction of a three-story addition, which will be crowned with a rooftop deck. The lots to the south will be made into parking over the short-term, and may be developed into housing in the future.
TRI plans to make the second floor of the renovated structure its headquarters. The foundation will move to the third floor from its current location in Northeast Minneapolis, where it has officed since the mid-1990s.
The ground floor will be managed by New Rules and is expected to be used in a variety of ways, including retail, co-working, a community room and a gallery / food pop-up space. New Rules will also operate the basement level, which could be made into a small music venue, shared “maker space” or a speakeasy / restaurant.
The renovation is expected to cost between $4.5 million and $5 million, said the foundation’s president, Patrick Troska. Plans for the building at 1001 Broadway are still speculative.
TRI CEO Calvin Littlejohn described the redevelopment project as a “game changer” for his company, which he started out of his North Minneapolis home in 2001, and the neighborhood at large. North Minneapolis suffered “severe losses” during the foreclosure crisis of the 2000s, according to the Metropolitan Council. Rates of homeownership in the neighborhood fell from 55 percent in 2000, to 42 percent in 2010.
Commenting on the structure of the partnership, Littlejohn said the foundation will be providing much of the capital up front, with TRI and New Rules each taking equity stakes, which will grow over time. Eventually, the foundation will sell all ownership rights to the two.
“Being able to share in that ownership is monumental, especially in this conversation we’re having around gentrification,” Littlejohn said. “Historically the community gets passed over. This [project] does not exclude us, and that is what is unique about it.”
For the foundation, it’s a homecoming of a sort, Troska said. For decades, North Minneapolis was a vibrant neighborhood that was home to both blacks and Jewish immigrants, whom were largely confined to the area by discriminatory restrictive housing covenants that barred them from buying homes elsewhere in the city.
“The majority of the Jewish population left in 1950s and 1960s. Then during the 1967 riots on the North Side, buildings on Plymouth Avenue were destroyed,” Troska said, leaving the area in a declining state for years.
“But the [Phillips] retained a nostalgic memory of the North Side and what it meant for the family,” added Troska.
Troska said the partnership expects to break ground in early 2019, with the hope of moving in by the end of the year. The remainder of the site will be redeveloped in phases over the following eight to 10 years.
