TO: Chair and Members of the Board
FROM: Jeffrey L. Oris, Executive Director
DATE: January 15, 2020
Title
APPROVING THE ADOPTION AND IMPLEMENTATION OF THE MARGATE COMMUNITY REDEVELOPMENT AGENCY COMMERCIAL DEMOLITION MATCHING GRANT GUIDELINES
Body
BACKGROUND: One of the problems with the commercial infrastructure within the MCRA is that there is a significant number of obsolete buildings that are situated on undersized parcels of land. These buildings, often built in the 1970's or before, have load bearing columns or supports throughout the building which means that interior walls cannot be moved. This leads to shopping centers with fixed tenants spaces and in which the tenant spaces are much smaller than demanded in the current marketplace. In contrast, modern commercial buildings are generally a shell with no interior load bearing walls or columns which allow for ever-changing interior space possibilities. The smaller size of lots that these buildings occupy is often the result of widening of State Road 7 over the years meaning there is little space for parking, on-site vehicular movement, adequate on-site stormwater drainage and retention systems, code-required landscaping, dumpster enclosures, and light fixtures.
The most efficient way to address these concerns is for a property owner to assemble several parcels, demolish existing, obsolete buildings, and rebuild a project that includes modern, flex buildings, and which has the space to meet all modern code requirements for stormwater, dumpsters, lighting, etc. The problem with this approach for the private sector is that the cost to carry land while trying to assemble several parcels can be high and while buildings on the land may be economically obsolete, they still have value and add cost to the purchase price of the property.
The proposed MCRA Commercial Demolition Match Grant Program would assist in reducing costs for one element of the aforementioned condition. This program is desig...
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