Front entrance of the Wausau Center Mall on Washington St. Image courtesy: WAOW TV
CONLEY COMMENTARY (WSAU) – Wausau residents and city leaders should contemplate the possibility of a large, ugly cement slab downtown. The possibility of redeveloping the Wausau Center Mall took a big step backward last week.
Last Friday was the deadline in the old development agreement between the city and T-Wall enterprises. The developer asked for an extension, and the City Council was not willing to just push back the dates. Lawyers for both sides will have to negotiate benchmarks within the project that T-Wall will have to meet.
Simply put, relations between the city and its downtown developer are frosty. If the council had to vote up or down on a straight extension, the decision might have been “no,” effectively killing the project.
There is something that makes me skeptical about the developer. The official reason for delaying groundbreaking by 9 months is that interest rates and construction costs are going up. Fair enough. But 9 months from now, interest rates are likely to be higher than today. Inflation is also going up, although not as quickly as a year ago. If costs are going to be higher tomorrow, why not begin building today? If Wausau was such a hot real estate market, developers would be falling over themselves to build as quickly as possible.
Remember the project includes 150 rental units at market rate. If building costs go up, that would be reflected in market rate rent. In short, the developer can cover their higher costs by spreading those expenses out over their new tenants.
There is another thing that gives me a moment of pause about the status of the project. The developer talked about another, larger project that includes 1,000 units in Howard. Perhaps that is part of the Wausau financing picture. Lenders do indeed look at whether a borrower is over-extended. I have no idea what that looks like for this developer.
The best alternative is that the city and the developer hammer out the language of a new agreement. The project won’t be finished until 2025, but at least it would be finished. This development has been bungled, but what’s the alternative? A giant concrete slab in the middle of Wausau isn’t viable
Chris Conley
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