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FARGO — A Sioux Falls-based development group’s bid to buy the former Fargo Cass Public Health building was accepted by the Fargo City Commission on Monday, May 2, paving the way for construction of a $38.5 million hotel and housing project downtown.
The agreement to sell 401 Third Ave. N. to Green Acre Development and Lloyd Companies, along with ESG Architecture and Design of Minneapolis, was approved on a 3-1 vote.
Commissioner John Strand voted no, and Commissioner Dave Piepkorn recused himself.
Piepkorn is part owner of the DVAW building (TruGreen), which Green Acre/Lloyd is acquiring, along with a parking lot owned by American Federal Bank, to complete their project about a block north of the Public Health site at Fourth Avenue North and Fourth Street.
Green Acre/Lloyd plans to build an AC by Marriott upscale hotel with 115 rooms, 108 market-rate apartments in a second building and 167 covered parking spots shared between them. That project will be completed by 2024.
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Green Acre/Lloyd will also raze the Public Health building and turn it into a surface parking lot for use by American Federal Bank.
MBA Development had offered to build a $13 million, 68-unit apartment building with main floor parking on the Public Health site.
The two-story Public Health building was built in 1962 with an addition in 1994.
Both developers had offered $500,000 for the property.
City officials hoped both projects could be built, but efforts to find a parking solution to which American Federal Bank would agree failed to gain any traction, according to Jim Gilmour, the city’s director of strategic planning and research.
“I think all efforts have been made” to get American Federal to agree to a different parking proposal, Commissioner Arlette Preston said.
Gilmour said both projects were consistent with city plans to redevelop underused properties and build more housing downtown.
