Millennium Tower (Filene's) | 426 Washington Street | Downtown

[Ron Newman]

Re: Filene's

What do you propose that the city do instead of what the Mayor has suggested?

 

[TheRifleman]

Re: Filene's

What do you propose that the city do instead of what the Mayor has suggested?

I don't know. I would talk to the Legal experts and see what would be the best solution.

#1 Find a way to tax them into selling at a loss.

#2 I would talk to multiple Colleges around the area to try to put a deal together to buyout Vornado and Gang. Possibly they can buy the sight for 100 million and build more of college dorms, with retail, possibly offices for the schools, in a multi Emerson, Suffolk, BU, BC. These schools could probably absorb 100 Million overtime and make the area nice. I'm not big on having the entire city a College haven but it's a solution.

#3 Bail them out. It's a slap in the face and it will cost the taxpayers millions as these scumbags end up reaping the profits. Seems to be the way America is going.

 

[KentXie]

Re: Filene's

Why should the taxpayers continue to bailout these clowns that paid too much for the site? This what our free markets have come to. Why doesn't Vornado take some of their cash on hand to invest in this project? WHY because they can't make money on this site. Nobody is going to buy condos in the DTX for 500 to 900K. This development was poorly planned and the city should take responsibility. Maybe we should gut the BRA because they are a waste of taxpayers money. That would be a great solution. The mayor should force the developer to cut it's losses and auction off the project to a developer that is willing to invest in BOSTON.

I'm not vouching to pay with taxpayers money and especially not to Vornado. However, if a different developer who has almost enough financial backing to build something there sooner than later but needs just a little boost of taxpayers money, I choose that. The area is a blight. Boston is MY and YOUR city. If a small amount of the taxpayer's money, money that is used to make the city better, can fix this area and put businesses back into DTX, then that is putting our taxes into good use.

 

[TheRifleman]

Re: Filene's

Builder: No ?blackmail? at Filene?s
By Thomas Grillo
Wednesday, March 10, 2010 - Updated 2h ago
+ Recent Articles

E-mail Print (30) Comments Text size Share Buzz up!The co-developer of the stalled Filene?s project said his team is not leaving a giant hole in Downtown Crossing to extract public money for the project.

?We have asked the city for help, but there?s a big difference between asking for help and trying to blackmail them,? said John Hynes, CEO of Gale International. ?We have done nothing but try to find a financing solution. It?s never been our strategy to deliberately put the real estate in bad condition.?

Hynes? comments yesterday come on the heels of an angry letter Mayor Thomas M. Menino sent to Vornado Realty Trust, the lead developer, threatening to seize the gutted landmark in Downtown Crossing by eminent domain after its chairman, Steven Roth, said he left the site of a former Alexander?s store in Manhattan vacant and blighted to extract taxpayer money for the project.

In the letter, Menino wrote ?The notion that you would purposefully cause this to occur - not due to financing difficulties or other problems beyond your control, but as an intentional cynical ploy to extract concessions from the public sector - is inexcusable.?

Roth did not return calls seeking comment. But Hynes insisted yesterday that he is unaware of any tactic by Vornado to let Filene?s fall into disrepair as a way to convince officials to come up with cash to jump-start the project.

If Menino wants to take the Filene?s property by eminent domain, the process could be completed in a few months - but the cost could be prohibitive, according to real estate attorneys.

A 2005 U.S. Supreme Court decision expanded the government?s authority to take private property by broadening the definition of ?public use.? Historically, governments used the power to build roads and schools. But in a case that pitted a group of Connecticut homeowners against City Hall, the court ruled the city can demolish homes in favor of a mixed-use project because the development served a ?public purpose? of boosting economic growth that outweighed homeowners? property rights.

?It was a groundbreaking case,? said Kurt Kusiak, attorney at Sally & Fitch in Boston. ?The New London case was an instance that involved taking private property and giving it to a private developer.?

But Kusiak said if the mayor and City Council approved taking Filene?s, the biggest fight would be over the price of the property because the city would be required to reimburse the owners at ?fair value.? Vornado paid $100 million for Filene?s in 2007, but its true value could be more than $200 million because Vornado has approval for a 1-million-square-foot office tower at the site.

John Palmieri, director of the Boston Redevelopment Authority, said real estate values have fallen and the parcel may not command such high prices today. He said eminent domain is only one option the city is considering to get the project completed. Vornado and Gale?s construction permits expire in August.

?We would consider an amended proposal if they come to us with a plan that they can fund and we feel makes sense for that neighborhood,? he said.

 

[pelhamhall]

Re: Filene's

I wonder if Boston could take by eminent domain just a small sliver of the site. They could say they want to build a walk-way and break up the super-block into two smaller, developable blocks.

This sliver cutting across the site would not cost Boston $200M, but it would completely sink the entire value of the site, as you would no longer be able to build anything on it other than two small structures, that they would have to come to the city to approve.

This scenario would leave the scumbag trash at Voranado and their dopey, clown-like local partner with a site that is no longer developable or saleable.

Then the city could always offer their sliver parcel up to a new developer, if it maintains connections across the site... even if it's an indoor hallway of the retail uses on the first floor.

In other words, why doesn't the city play dirty like Voranado did in NYC with that other department store.

Can't the city take a piece of this by eminent domain, just to sink the entire proposed development? It's horribly illegal I imagine. I hope they can't do it. But still... so cool if they could.

 

[briv]

Re: Filene's

That's great that the city is actually addressing this, but look what it took--a monumentally idiotic boast by the developer in a public forum that ended up on the Wall Street Journal's site. Why has Menino never addressed the Kensington pit just down the street at Washington and LaGrange? Or the parking lot where Hayward Place is supposed to be? Do these not contribute to DTX's blight?

Or how about the many abandoned or severely neglected properties scattered all over the city's core, like this bombed-out shell that's been empty for years on Boylston in the Back Bay:

 

[kennedy]

Re: Filene's

That building is literally on the ground pleading for adaptive reuse.

 

[Suffolk 83]

Re: Filene's

The building is screaming for adaptive destruction

 

[kennedy]

Re: Filene's

You kidding? I'm talking about the townhouse in the back. You really don't like it?

 

[itchy]

Re: Filene's

Or how about the many abandoned or severely neglected properties scattered all over the city's core, like this bombed-out shell that's been empty for years on Boylston in the Back Bay

Or the blight that Menino's BFFL Ronald Druker has been trying to manufacture by leaving the Arlington Building vacant for years. Push up the rents to a level no one in their right mind would/could ever pay; then when *shock* nobody rents your space, you tell Boss Menino that your building is outmoded, worthless and must be replaced or the city will slide into depression.

Druker's never mouthed off the way Roth did -- though as a small-timer, he's probably not had the opportunity to speak at Columbia, or had reporters taking note of what he says -- but his actions are the same. Oddly, Menino doesn't seem to mind.

Welcome to another episode of Tom Menino's 16-year soap opera, "Hubpocracy."

 

[KentXie]

Re: Filene's

That's great that the city is actually addressing this, but look what it took--a monumentally idiotic boast by the developer in a public forum that ended up on the Wall Street Journal's site. Why has Menino never addressed the Kensington pit just down the street at Washington and LaGrange? Or the parking lot where Hayward Place is supposed to be? Do these not contribute to DTX's blight?

Or how about the many abandoned or severely neglected properties scattered all over the city's core, like this bombed-out shell that's been empty for years on Boylston in the Back Bay:

It could be said that Filene is more central to the area, larger in size, and that it looks 20x worse than either the Kensington or Hayward. Hayward serves a purpose as a parking lot, Kensington is at least not a hole. However something should be done about it.

 

[tobyjug]

Re: Filene's

I'm not all that familiar with how ED works. Is it possible for the City to take the property at fair market value and 'flip it' at the same price or a small profit?

Yes.

 

[tobyjug]

Re: Filene's

I don't know. I would talk to the Legal experts and see what would be the best solution.

#1 Find a way to tax them into selling at a loss.

#2 I would talk to multiple Colleges around the area to try to put a deal together to buyout Vornado and Gang. Possibly they can buy the sight for 100 million and build more of college dorms, with retail, possibly offices for the schools, in a multi Emerson, Suffolk, BU, BC. These schools could probably absorb 100 Million overtime and make the area nice. I'm not big on having the entire city a College haven but it's a solution.

#3 Bail them out. It's a slap in the face and it will cost the taxpayers millions as these scumbags end up reaping the profits. Seems to be the way America is going.

#1 is unconstitutional and a civil rights violation.

 

[tobyjug]

Re: Filene's

I wonder if Boston could take by eminent domain just a small sliver of the site. They could say they want to build a walk-way and break up the super-block into two smaller, developable blocks.

This sliver cutting across the site would not cost Boston $200M, but it would completely sink the entire value of the site, as you would no longer be able to build anything on it other than two small structures, that they would have to come to the city to approve.

Sorry. You would pay not only for the part you took, but "severance" damages for the remainder. Severance damages, in this case, would be the lost overall value for the site.

 

[statler]

Re: Filene's

Ok, it's possible, is it feasible?

 

[tobyjug]

Re: Filene's

Possibility and feasibility are the same thing. Is it wise to take only a piece? I don't think so. You'd pay almost as much as if you took the whole thing. And you'd still only own a piece.

 

[Ron Newman]

Re: Filene's

Why is 'tax them in to selling at a loss" unconstitutional, if the tax is on blighted, vacant property only? The owner can avoid the tax by developing, which is the whole point here.

 

[JohnAKeith]

Re: Filene's

If the city takes it, wouldn't that end up giving the developer a "subsidy" anyway?

I don't see eminent domain as anything but grandstanding. I certainly wouldn't want it to happen.

It's wonderful that commercial real estate is worth so less than it was several years ago. All I know is, my assessed value increased over ten percent and my residential property tax went up 15 percent, this year.

 

[kennedy]

Re: Filene's

Wait, sarcasm?

Maybe the best route is the one which hurts the most in the short term - have the city do nothing and wait until the market forces the developer to do something, be it sell or build. I guess some weird city policy might actually make it profitable for them to sit, but I'm no real estate/public policy expert.

 

[tobyjug]

Re: Filene's

Why is 'tax them in to selling at a loss" unconstitutional, if the tax is on blighted, vacant property only? The owner can avoid the tax by developing, which is the whole point here.

The state constitution permits taxation to raise revenue. Each property owner need pay only his or her proportional share. The purpose of the idea being advanced is to create a penalty, not to raise revenue. Thus, it is not authorized, and is unconstitutional.

If you wish to avoid this problem you could try to recast it as a fine rather than as a tax, but you will have to come up with some legal authority to support your effort.

I look forward to seeing some case law cited!