So much for the Cleveland Immigration Center...

 

Cleveland school district agrees to lease vacant Jewish Federation building downtown

Published: Sunday, August 29, 2010, 11:15 AM

Thomas Ott, The Plain Dealer

 

 

 

CLEVELAND, Ohio -- The Jewish Federation of Cleveland's former downtown headquarters won't be turned into a welcome center for immigrants, but the group's leaders have found another civic purpose for the PlayhouseSquare complex.

 

The federation, which moved its offices to Beachwood in July, is set to lease the space to the Cleveland School District, which will turn it into classrooms for juniors and seniors from MC2STEM High School.

 

The school board approved the lease Tuesday; the federation's board will vote this week. The district will pay no rent for the first 10 years of the lease, which includes annual options to renew for 10 more years, but it must pick up operating expenses.

 

http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2010/08/cleveland_school_district_agre.html

That just means that it won't go at that location.  There was no reason to believe that the Jewish Federation Building was the best location for an immigration center, anyway.

Some good news for downtown...

Bober Markey Fedorovich Expands North to Downtown Cleveland

 

Akron, Ohio (Oct. 7, 2010) – Bober Markey Fedorovich (BMF), a regional accounting and business advisory firm headquartered in Akron, Ohio, has expanded to Cuyahoga County with a new office located in the heart of downtown Cleveland, at 515 Euclid Avenue, adjacent to the popular East Fourth Street entertainment district.

 

http://www.bobermarkey.com/breaking_news_and_alerts/cleveland_office_1010

isn't that the parking garage?  They must of taken up one of the storefronts.

Ha, if that's indeed where it's going, that means that Akron-based companies are in both of the 515 Euclid storefronts.

That will be a good place for an outpost, and likely .  Can't imagine more than 10 people in that spot, it is a bit on the small side.  Especially compared to the floorspace of Environments 4 Business.

 

From their website (http://www.bobermarkey.com/breaking_news_and_alerts/cleveland_office_1010):

 

"The new facility will be used as a more convenient meeting location for its expanding base of Cleveland-area clients."

 

and this is a nice plug:

 

"“Right now, there are many benefits to being in downtown Cleveland, with the numerous  investment and development projects taking place,” he explained.  “The multi-million dollar Euclid corridor project spurred a tremendous amount of re-investment from Euclid Avenue property owners near our new office;  the Medical Mart will be breaking ground soon;  and we’re excited to see what is in store for the Flats.  We’re pleased to be in the center of it all.”

This is good news!  The more life on lower Euclid the better. 

Did anyone see this yet?

 

 

Ambitious ideas and hopefully some will happen, but what is really depressing is to continue to read the mostly over exaggerated comments about crime downtown, "no one wants to come downtown", etc..etc... the usual drivel. I do wish articles like this would not point out so much ambition until it is ready to happen.... This is because if it does not, it gives the Cleveland inferiority complex a chance to rocket.

 

Ironically, from reading the comments, I have come to the idea that many who bitch about certain situations downtown or in Cleveland, end up supporting politicians who support political policies that breed the Cleveland/downtown situations they (CDC Peanut Gallery Dooms Dayers) deem negative and point out the most in the first place! I do not think they'll ever make the connections. Its easier to blame Kucinich for everything including their obesity, ED, and balding issues!

 

It is good to know what those who have not been downtown in 25 years are saying and how to rebuttal this stuff, because it is this kind of information that spreads like cancer furthering the local inferiority complex/bad images to last indefinitely and affect another generation who gives this place a chance with a clean slate! I saw one or two well thought comments. Maybe some here can check them out and counter. Anyway, here is the link to the article. 

 

http://www.cleveland.com/business/index.ssf/2010/11/downtown_advocates_aim_to_rebr.html#_login

 

 

Oh, am I allowed to post the link like that?

I think they should drop the 9-12 thing combine it with the Avenue District and call the whole damn thing "The Avenue District".

Might be a good idea. Maybe too many names makes too much confusion and sets things up for expectations to be high for too any things---and if something fails...now we have accused of failing....The Avenue District.. AND The 9-12 District which I am sure CDC'ers would salivate over to make their comments!  This area, with some simple changes to start, would make it more appealing.

Wow!  Can't believe no one had much to say about this article in the PD.

The article illustrated nicely how new office construction downtown is at least partly or even mostly a game of musical chairs that leaves empty buildings in its wake [makes me wonder slightly why we're pouring millions of public dollars into the FEB office building, but whatever].  Definitely a good thing to see property owners mobilizing in response.  At worst we'll see some improved streetscape.  Longer term, maybe this will help jumpstart more residential conversions and we'll see some more retail, even if ho hum services for office workers.

 

I'm not a big fan of the branding though and am skeptical the new name will stick even a little bit.  Which is OK, because it's terrible, IMHO.

^ I have always saw a lot of this as musical chairs....or for lack of a better way to put it.. "sprawl within downtown"  The cultural  obsession with "new" I see as a driving force as well. With creativity many buildings can likely be renovated and adapted to new needs.

 

There must be a whole industry out there that earns a paycheck from promoting such ideas and ventures with the salesman to promote the philosophy, but again... it takes some imagination and creativity...and especially on the economic end to show how and why it can be more feasible, if and when it can be.

 

Instead of building new, I have always thought making what we already have the best it can be should be a priority first....just like in the case of filling existing voids with something socially redeeming and useful/attractive...before adding new.

 

What was disturbing the most...as with most CDC articles are the comments that illustrate just how disconnected many people are with their city.

I don't see anything wrong with Downtown office tenants playing musical chairs.  I'm sure this happens in just about every major U.S. city.  People always bemoan that it is not a new company moving in, but ignore the benefits of such movement.  Movement creates investment.  Calfee wants to move and grabs up a relatively unused and beautiful building downtown.  They sink millions of dollars into the renovation and add a garage.  All that is good for downtown.  The space they left can now be used to attract new tenants and/or force the property owner to make some changes in terms of adapting/upgrading the office space and/or repurposing the space.

^ That sounds good in this case, and in that case I would favor moves.... but what about the problem of risking allowing those properties that become vacant to sit for a looooong time to the point they begin to crumble. What you describe is good if there is investment banging on the door standing in line waiting to occupy a building. But that is not the case as much as we'd like it to be here right now.

Something needs to be done with this area. I was driving around downtown Sunday morning and saw the homeless people sleeping in front of the old E OH Gas building. That was where I had my first job downtown after moving here after college, and it was just sad. 9th is the main artery to the rock hall and science center and should be awesome looking.

^^Shall we force the tenants to stay as the building crumbles?  I feel a lot of your complaints on various subject matters, but your solutions are often out of the realm of possibility and do not take into consideration the legalities involved.  Companies are free to move whenever their lease says they are.  We don't want restrictive regulations that make them feel trapped in an out of date, not well maintained office space.  It would piss off the company and turn the landlord into an emboldened slumlord.  Landlords have to be kept on their toes.  They can't just sit around and collect rent.  They have to do whatever they have to do to retain and attract tenants..... and that pressure-cooker is a good thing for the City.

but what about the problem of risking allowing those properties that become vacant to sit for a looooong time to the point they begin to crumble. What you describe is good if there is investment banging on the door standing in line waiting to occupy a building. But that is not the case as much as we'd like it to be here right now.

 

Yeah, I agree with you.  Sure, you have a new Calfee project, but that's after that building sat totally empty for a decade.  And along with the Calfee project, you have an East Ohio Gas Company building sitting 100% empty for years, with no clear future.

 

In any case, even if there's a silver lining to this type of building filtering, it's not clear why we should drive the process with public dollars, unless there's a really compelling reason- to keep a tenant downtown, for instance.  Otherwise, I'd rather see the public money directed only towards reinvigorating older buildings rather than accelerating the filtering.

I don't have a problem with the NineTwelve branding, as long as there is the accompanying actual work (obviously) and marketing that emphasizes the "9 a.m. to Midnight" mixed-use aspect, which is sorely lacking. The development model along E 9th is a holdover from the 70s and 80s when the expectation was that office workers would only be downtown during the daytime, and so office space was maximized as was lunchtime-oriented retail.

 

The problem of businesses leaving E 9th means that there is an opportunity to throw in more residential and improve the retail. Why not have marketing accompany it?

Something needs to be done with this area. I was driving around downtown Sunday morning and saw the homeless people sleeping in front of the old E OH Gas building. That was where I had my first job downtown after moving here after college, and it was just sad. 9th is the main artery to the rock hall and science center and should be awesome looking.

 

They always sleep there because a) no one will force them to leave and b) there are a lot of warm sewer and steam grates on that corner.

I knew there were grates around there, but they weren't on the corner where the grates were (as I've seen in the past, which is also bad) but inside the alcove (? probably using the wrong word, sorry architecture folks), like where the doors are and it's recessed from the street a little.  It was awful.  And because it was cold, they had blankets completely covering every inch of them. And they were off-white blankets, so it looked like corpses dumped there from a morgue. It was just sad.

Sad, yes.  But who has the legal right to tell them to move?

 

BTW, did I see Mr. and Mrs. docbroc cutting the corner at E 9th and Chester around 7 pm or so on Saturday night?

Well, I would think the city has the legal right to tell them to move.  Whether they do or not is another issue.

Walking down the street, you dont see many problems. But the office vacancy rates are a real problem

Well, I would think the city has the legal right to tell them to move. Whether they do or not is another issue.

 

Despite this common misconception that the City simply panders to every wish and desire of the homeless advocates, the City did indeed have a policy in the 1990's which allowed the police to forcibly remove homeless people from downtown and transport them to other locations.  The City got sued in Federal Court and was going to get its arse handed to it, so it had to reach an agreement to stop that practice.

 

Some cities have laws against sleeping in parks or putting your bags down on the sidewalk.  But, the problem with such laws is taht they cannot be selectively enforced.  It has to apply to all City parks and it can't be applied to homeless people only.  It would preclude me from putting my bag down as well if I got tired.  That's the thing I think most are missing.  If you make a law that you can't sleep in parks, for instance, then arguably that would preclude a saturday afternoon nap at Edgewater or a sunbath on the Malls.  All of us end up sacraficing our freedom/liberties too to make the uncomfortable feel a little more secure.

 

Personally, I don't think that homelesness is nearly the problem along 9th/12th as it is in other parts of downtown.

This shows the problem.

 

http://media.cleveland.com/pdgraphics_impact/photo/9046029-large.jpg

 

KJP Edit: sorry, this is a copyrighted graphic which cannot be displayed here at UrbanOhio. If you want to see it, you have to go to click on the Cleveland.com link so they can show the number of hits to advertisers.

Sad, yes.  But who has the legal right to tell them to move?

 

If I owned a property and someone was sitting on my doorstep (doorstep meaning a part of the building I own) the property owner would then have a right to ask them to move. Would you allow someone to sit on your front doorstep and take a leak, or maybe more? And yes, that is what happens often in some areas. It is going on right now on the square but I do not want to mention the place.

 

Maybe instead of a dog park, we need "homeless parks" where they can safely and privately sleep, go to the toilet, etc... There could be little human dog houses for shelter and the Amish can supply those and we'd generate a new economy from this!  That would bear the taking up camp on the city's front door--and NO, I am not suggesting we ignore the issue with out of site/mind, but it is hardly ignored here and doubt it will be out of site. Afterall, how can this scene on a prime avenue be beneficial for attracting new interest...  :-o

Such is a sad scene occupying, as R&R indicated...a place that should be kept prime looking. Is that the first impression we want to portray of the street?

 

On a previous post I made, I also never refuted the fact that a tenant has the right to move. I was simply stating what is happening as a result of the shifting around. Keeping a place totally empty or barely occupied is not helping the cause either.

 

Although I would like to fully agree with your point about newer places forcing slack landlords to giddy up with polishing up their properties, and actually I think it should.... The reality probably would be that it would do little. I would hate to see these places demolished and more parking lots created that would take us back to early 60's 9th where there were surface lots. I remember seeing that in an aerial photo on here somewhere.

 

There are just too many large properties in this area that are sitting virtually dead. a 20-plus story tower....a 29 story tower. As a general rule, I just like the idea of utilizing and exploring the use of existing spaces first. The approach needs to be aggressive...not desperate, but aggressive.

 

^Or at least the idea of not publicly subsidizing the emptying out of these older buildings.

I see the homeless thread has now moved from the Public Square re-design thread to this thread with the same tired "shock" that there are homeless in Cleveland and it is a problem...of course unlike any other city in the nation (or the world for that matter)...even been to San Fransico?  By the way, it has been a while since I have been to DC.  Do the homeless still sleep on the heating grates at night there?  I remember that the area in Foggy Botton by the State Department was particularly popular...oh look, I am contributing to the off topic chatter.

Sad, yes. But who has the legal right to tell them to move?

 

If I owned a property and someone was sitting on my doorstep (doorstep meaning a part of the building I own) the property owner would then have a right to ask them to move. Would you allow someone to sit on your front doorstep and take a leak, or maybe more? And yes, that is what happens often in some areas. It is going on right now on the square but I do not want to mention the place.

 

Of course private properties owners have the right to tell them to move or request that the cops order them to move from their private property.  But public spaces (parks, bus stops, benches, public squares) are a different story and that is where the problem lies.  And you are simply arguing with yourself if the point you are trying to make is that the sight of homeless people walking around the streets, panhandling, urinating, and sleeping on benches, sewers, etc. is not particularly appealing to the general public.  That goes without saying.

With such low vacancy rates you'd think some developers would try to snatch some buildings up for residential conversions.

Sorry Hts121, didn't see your post until now (got called for a jury after lunch yesterday).  I'm pretty sure I was in my house at 7pm on Saturday, so no.

Why is it that everytime we address an issue like this here...instead of facing up to what we need to do about the given issue...we act like because it happens in other places, it must be ok. We need to take care of our portion of the neighborhood in this world, so to speak...and not sit back with complacency because an issue exists somewhere else. Let's see how far having homeless straying all over 9th Street gets us. The problem here may be disproportionate to our size, regardless of it existing in other areas. And yes, I have sisters in San Fran.

 

Btw....Hts121... Public ordinances can be utilized prohibiting defecation or urination and loitering in public spaces. The former two points constitutes a public health issue. Just because I look at this as an issue that deters good investment, does not mean I am some neo-con suburbanite who is out of touch! Rather, its about not sugarcoating this issue with tones that its no big deal. It is a big deal. Uh oh... I sense a real pressure cooker brewing here!

Oh for the love of Christ.

Why is it that everytime we address an issue like this here...instead of facing up to what we need to do about the given issue...we act like because it happens in other places, it must be ok.

 

I feel exactly the same way.

 

The environment you create will foster a culture in the community.  This is why California is a very different place than Ohio, even though there are many Ohioans in California.

 

Create a different environment and behavior can be changed...unless you don't care about homeless or crime and think everything is just fine.

 

Again...why don't we talk about Downtown Office Development News in this thread and solve the homeless problem in the appropriate thread.

Agreed.

<b>Ohio Savings Plaza building in downtown Cleveland is up for sale</b>

 

CB Richard Ellis announced today that it has the listing to sell the 18-story Ohio Savings Plaza building, 1801 E. Ninth St. in downtown Cleveland.

 

CB's news release did not identify the seller, but the property became an FDIC asset after the agency seized the former AmFin Financial Corp. of Cleveland on Dec. 4, 2009, and sold many of its assets to New York Community Bancorp...

 

http://www.crainscleveland.com/article/20101216/FREE/101219869

Here is the plain dealers version

 

http://www.cleveland.com/business/index.ssf/2010/12/former_amtrust_bank_headquarte.html

<b>MCPc technology company signs lease to move from Strongsville to Plain Dealer building</b>

 

CLEVELAND, Ohio -- A Strongsville technology company has signed a lease and plans to move 165 jobs and its corporate headquarters to the eastern edge of downtown Cleveland.

 

MCPc, a provider of tech products and support services, will move in June to The Plain Dealer's office building at 1801 Superior Ave. The growing company, which is running out of room, wants to be centrally situated for customers.

"We're committed to Cleveland and bringing new jobs downtown and we're excited about being in the heart of it all," Beth Stec, director of corporate communications and human resources at MCPc, said Tuesday. "I think the building is so beautiful and state-of-the art that our customers will love to come and visit."

 

 

http://www.cleveland.com/business/index.ssf/2010/12/mcpc_technology_company_signs.html

That is great news.

Rosetta brought ~400, MPCc bringing 165.. Not bad

Glad to see the PD actually reported this good news about downtown! :-P

Glad to see the PD actually reported this good news about downtown! :-P

 

Well it was their building so they didnt need to go far...

Yes, that was sarcasm hence the emoticon. :)

I think its less of a downtown poaching downtown problem and more of a suburbs poaching downtown problem

A bumper crop of empty offices in downtown Cleveland: Brent Larkin

 

When Werner Minshall bought the Galleria and adjacent Tower at Erieview just eight years ago, the $30 million price tag was widely viewed as a steal.

 

After all, as recently as 1991 the 40-story tower was on the tax rolls as a $93 million property. And when it opened in 1986, with a cast of first-rate retailers and restaurants, the glassy, glitzy Galleria next door had cost Dick Jacobs $43 million -- not including the value of the land.

 

Sure, by 2003 the Galleria and the Tower were struggling, but so low was the $30 million sale price that conventional wisdom agreed with a Plain Dealer assessment that Minshall got himself a "bargain."

Some bargain.

 

The Galleria has become, at times, a ghost town. When it rains, the roof sometimes leaks. The food court is hurting. And at noontime one day recently, I walked past Glitz, a female fashion store with a large sign that screamed, "Going out of Business Sale." Inside, the store was empty.

 

In the adjacent office tower, it's a struggle to keep the occupancy rate near 60 percent -- which is below what's usually needed to break even.

 

"It's Armageddon," said Minshall, describing the status of commercial and retail property along the East Ninth Street corridor. "There's almost no hope. My equity in this investment is wiped out. It's disastrous. I love Cleveland, but there's sort of a poisonous, weird attitude there. People spend all this time muddling on things that never get done."

 

http://www.cleveland.com/opinion/index.ssf/2011/03/a_bumper_crop_of_empty_offices.html

Mr. Positive strikes again...I thought one of the comments hit it right on the nail ("and the point of this article was what exactly"....and on Cleveland.com of all places).

 

It was Larkin and his buddy Feagler's generation that abandoned the city...they both have balls to comment about anything.

Stupid, pointless article.

Par for the Larkin course.

Just so I understand the hatred of Larkin, it's because he's friends, or has supported politicians who made negative changes to downtown? I don't find him nearly as negative as most posters here do.

^When he bemoans the Galleria, does he talk about Gardens under Glass?

When he repeats quotes from one developer saying "there is almost no hope" does he mention that Class A office space is over  90% occupied?

He cherry picks the worst of Cleveland and presents it like that is the whole picture. 

What is one suppossed to do, just not talk about it.  Not only did Larkin write about it, but Cleveland's very own Mayor said "It's bad, really bad".  In addition to that, two large property owners along the cooridor speak on how bad the situation is.  There is no hiding that, and we didn't really need to hear it from them.  Just a drive along 9th Street tells the story as it pales in comparison to it's look in the early to mid 90's.  Writing about the situation put's it out there.  It lets people know that it's in piss poor shape.  That is what starts the discussions on what to do and how to revive it.  The problem in Cleveland however is we tend to always hit rock bottom with everything before we do anything (Think Euclid Ave, Flats, Midtown, Slavik Village).  It's always just so hard to achieve it's former glory after that.

 

I love Cleveland, but the condition of E 9th street really irks me.  Cleveland is surrounded by suburbs just as all big cities are.  There is no reason 9th Street should have ever got to the point where it is now.