By Jim Balow | West Virginia Gazette | June 10, 2009

Charleston, WV
Sixteen years after a city agency bought and razed the old Holley Hotel, a developer has finally been found to do something with the mid-town parking lot.

It won't become the offices for an energy company or a new hotel, although there was serious interest in both projects in recent years, Charleston Urban Renewal Authority Director Pat Brown said.

Photo by Ron Dylewski

And while one observer called that a missed an opportunity to do much more with site, Brown and Mayor Danny Jones said there were no other options.

CURA members named JDL Castle Corp. as the designated developer of the CURA-owned property just west of the Quarrier Diner, once the site of the Holley and the Worthy hotels.

CURA bought the hotels from the late Frankie Veltri, tore them down and paved the sites as a parking lot while waiting for someone to redevelop the property. The agency is asking $1.47 million, or $35 per square foot, for the site -- a little less than an acre.

Two developers, both with identical proposals to build 20,000-square-foot offices for the FBI, responded after CURA advertised the site a month ago, Brown said. But only one of them appeared at the CURA meeting Wednesday. Gary L. Cobb of West Second Street Associates was a no-show.

CURA members agreed nevertheless to give Cobb a second chance. "If he wants to come and make a presentation in the next few days, we could designate both as developers," Brown said. In that case, CURA would let the federal General Services Administration choose the final developer.

Dewitt Blundon of Old Colony realty in Charleston said he has been helping JDL Castle look for FBI sites here for about two years. The FBI has outgrown its existing rented offices in One Bridge Place, and new security restrictions mean the agency needs to been in its own building, said Brice Shearburn of JDL Castle.

Because of the security rules, the building will be set back 30 feet from Quarrier Street, Shearburn said. The offices will be on the second floor, with enclosed parking on the first level.

Brown asked what else would be located on the ground floor besides parking. A site plan shows that parking would take up only about half the ground floor.

Shearburn said he couldn't go into detail. "Expansion and room for radio and electronic equipment. By agreement, we don't show specifics of the interior."

As proposed to CURA, the building would also require the purchase and demolition of the former Quarrier Diner.>/strong>

The site plan shows the eastern edge of the building would sit on the site of the diner, and a driveway off Dunbar Street would go through the parking lot behind the diner. The Young family owns both the closed diner and the rear parking lot, plus the Ott Building behind the parking lot.

That worried Alan Englebert, director of the Kanawha County Public Library. The library wants to acquire the Ott Building for its proposed new downtown library. "Obviously we have a lot of concern about the project."

Shearburn said the FBI project would not include the Ott Building. However, the Young family apparently wants to sell all three parcels -- the Ott, the diner and the parking lot -- together.

"From what we've heard so far, we're concerned but not alarmed," Englebert said after the meeting. "The gentleman indicated it's not a problem. I hope that's true."

Later Wednesday, Blundon of Old Colony told the Gazette the developers no longer need the diner property. He said he and Shearburn talked with a lawyer for the Young family immediately after the CURA meeting.

"It's less expensive for the developer to do the deal without that property," Blundon said. "We talked long and hard with the attorney. They wanted us to buy all three [parcels]. I think we can work around it. They'll have to move the building a little bit to the left.

"We don't anticipate that will be a problem. But the GSA could say we don't want the Quarrier Diner that close; you have to get rid of it."

Shearburn, in an e-mail to the Gazette, said the GSA must make a technical evaluation of the project in the next two to three weeks. "I am sure you understand the procurement process is a competitive bid and JDL Castle Corporation is but one of potential developers."

Another developer is apparently proposing to put the building at Northgate Business Park, he said, although that is outside the GSA's target zone and distant from the FBI's clients -- the U.S. Attorneys Office in the federal building downtown.

Jeff Miller, a designer with Hunter/Miller+Associates, told CURA members they were missing an opportunity to do more with the site.

"I think it's a wonderful opportunity for the city of Charleston." The site is better suited for multiple uses, including housing, which is badly needed downtown, he said.

Brown, after the meeting, said CURA board members considered Miller's remarks. "I think the consensus is this is not the best use, but the parcel has been sitting there for 16 years. Is it what we'd prefer? No. It could have been more. But we'll be getting something there, and we'll have $1.4 million to use for other projects."

Since the hotels were razed -- the Worthy in 1987, the Holley in 1993 -- CURA has had just two serious inquiries about the property, Brown said, but neither panned out.

Mayor Jones was not particularly enthusiastic about the project. "We don't have anybody else," he said. "We haven't had an offer on that property in 16 years. I don't have an alternative."

Miller called it a missed opportunity. "It's a shame. That site could have returned more to the city, both financially and to the community. It just slides down that slippery slope. It's the resignation that bothers me. We need to be more proactive in our redevelopment."

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