HRA, City Council ponder downtown redevelopment
October 25, 2018
City officials are eyeing another redevelopment project in downtown Elk River, and the idea stoked a range of responses.
Members of the Elk River Housing and Redevelopment Authority and the Elk River City Council held a joint meeting to hear and discuss the idea before the regular council meeting Monday night.
Economic Development Director Amanda Othoudt explained a survey and inspection report that covers 24 parcels of land and eight buildings near Highway 10 between Jackson and Lowell avenues.
The council decided in May to ask a Minneapolis firm for the report as a part of the city’s exploration of potential downtown redevelopment. The firm’s report found that seven of the eight buildings inspected are structurally substandard, exceeding the requirements for a tax-increment financing district, which would use public dollars to rehabilitate the designated area with the former Elk River Area School District headquarters in one corner and the building on the corner of Main and Jackson Avenue in the other. Many of the businesses on the south side of Main Street between Jackson and Lowell avenues would be part of the development area.