CHICKASHA –The downtown business grant program has run its course and was “incredibly successful,” Chickasha Economic Development Council Director Jim Cowan said.
During the life of the program, private investors spent $5,472,408 on property improvements and were reimbursed $1,492,656, records reflect.
In simple terms, on average, investors were reimbursed $1 for every $3.66 they spent to renovate buildings in the central business district – a ratio that went “above and beyond” the investment/reimbursement match that was required to receive one of the grants, Cowan said.
Central Business District (CBD) grant qualifications provided for reimbursement of $1 for every $3 of private funds invested, with a maximum reimbursement of $25 per square foot based on improvement square footage.
The program was an incentive for owners of downtown property located between First and Seventh streets, and between Kansas and Choctaw avenues, to make improvements to their properties being used for retail trade producing sales or use tax dollars for the City of Chickasha.
Significant improvements to real estate raise the property’s value, “and as property values go up, property taxes do, too,” developer Chet Hitt reminded those attending the CEDC meeting.
Downtown economic development grants were financed with the proceeds remaining from a special seven thirty-seconds of one percent (7/32%) excise tax that Chickasha voters approved in 2011 for “economic development purposes” for a period of five years.
Projects that received CBD grants included Crazy 8 Café, Brandi’s Bar & Grill,The Flower Shop Winery & Pizzeria, the Petroleum Building, Perrefitte Home & Gifts/Nailynn Beauty and Spa, Legendary Bicycles, The GatheringVenue, 409W. Chickasha (Alora), and Luigi’s Cucina Italiana.
Brandi’s Bar & Grill produced an investment/reimbursement ratio of $9.52:$1, and the Flower Shop Winery & Pizzeria ratio was $7.84:$1, Cowan noted.
“All of the funds will be depleted” when The Savoy 1902 rehab project grant is approved, Cowan announced April 8. That project received preliminary grant approval and final approval from the City Council of $388,600 is expected to be made soon. Overhaul of the 123-yearold hotel building cost approximately $1.3 million, owner Chet Hitt told Southwest Ledger.
Some critics claimed that the $25,333 grant approved for renovation of the 105-year-old downtown building formerly occupied by Wild Ox Axe Throwing was tax money poured down the drain when that company went out of business. Not so, Cowan said. The grant was issued to the owner of the building, and that location is now occupied by another tenant: Palm + Co. Apparel.
Critics also asserted that rather than spend tax dollars to incentivize redevelopment, the City of Chickasha should ‘just let the free enterprise system work.’
“I think we tried that for about 40 years and nothing happened,” Cowan said.
Several downtown renovation projects that collectively cost $7 million didn’t receive central business district grants.
For example, Chickasha’s First National Bank spent $5.2 million to restore the Chickasha Hotel. “That building was a drug-infested crack house” that needed “extensive rehabilitation,” Cowan said.
Today its 32 rooms house low-income individuals. “It’s meeting housing needs for people who likely couldn’t afford other places,” bank CEO John Gorton told the Ledger two years ago. The bottom floor of the building is occupied by law firms.
The Chickasha Hotel was rehabilitated before the downtown business grant program started, Cowan related. In addition, that renovation project was financed in part from federal tax credits awarded because the building provides affordable housing and is a historic structure.
Phase 1 of the downtown park cost $1.4 million.That included construction of the 50-foot-tall leg lamp statue, renovation of the nearby visitor center building and mercantile store, plus landscaping and an irrigation system, Cowan said. The Chickasha Economic Development Council donated $25,000 and the balance came from private donations. No grant application was submitted for that project.
One other project was developer Chet Hitt’s $200,000 renovation of the formerly vacant Mill Building adjacent to the railroad station in OldTown Chickasha near the leg lamp statue. He instead submitted his grant application on The Savoy Hotel building.