Council Eyes Commercial Building for Current City Hall Site

ST. CLOUD -- It will most likely be a commercial building that gets built on the site of the current St. Cloud City Hall. The city council held a special meeting on Monday afternoon to learn about the three groups interested in buying the property.

Council President Jeff Georger says two of the projects had residential as their main focus and were dependent on federal money, which takes a long time to secure. So, the council prioritized the third project which is all commercial.

Two stories initially and if they have enough interest in the property they would go up to four stories with probably a restaurant on the main floor.

Back in 2015 Inventure Properties proposed building a $19 million office building to the west of City Hall, which did not happen. Georger says they would have a minority interest in this new project.

The main buyer is a company out of Minneapolis that does projects like this all over the country, their specialty is the reuse of areas like this.

Georger says Inventure still owns the former church property to the south and new development on the City Hill site could spur that development as well.

He says there are no specifics yet as far as a TIF agreement or a sale price.

A final deal wouldn't take place until the city moves out of that location and moves into the new City Hall later this year or early next year.