Gary Redevelopment Commission officials have hired a real estate brokerage firm to advise the city on the best way to find buyers for several large, municipal-owned properties — including the Genesis Convention Center, the one-time Sears, Roebuck & Co. building and the Gleason Park Golf Course.
Redevelopment officials voted 4-0 Wednesday, with commissioner Marion Johnson absent, to award a professional services contract to NAI, a New York-based firm that also has offices in both the Chicago and Detroit areas.
Joseph Van Dyk executive director of the commission, said he hopes the firm will help the city maximize the return on the properties, many of which are in downtown Gary.
The contract approved last week does not provide a specific fee to the company for their work, but NAI will be compensated when the properties are sold by the city. The firm will receive a share of the eventual sale prices.
NAI executive vice president for industrial services Chris Gary said the firm was established 40 years ago and has had experience in helping municipalities find buyers for sites, including in Detroit where they helped the city find a buyer for the site of the former Tiger Stadium ballpark.
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“We have helped municipalities and schools in finding buyers for properties,” Gary said. “We have experience in this area,” adding that much of the firm’s work has been in dealing with finding buyers for abandoned storefronts.
NAI officials said they have worked with city officials in Hammond and Gary to advise them on projects.
Among the properties the firm will work on under this contract is the Genesis Convention Center at 5th Avenue and Broadway, which city officials have said they wish to sell because it is too costly for them to continue to run in its current form.
They also are looking to sell the building at 839 Broadway, which once was the downtown Sears’ store and in more recent years has operated as office space for several city government agencies — including the Redevelopment Commission.
Another property the city wants to sell, The golf course at Gleason Park, just south of Interstate 80/94 along Broadway, actually is two properties. Van Dyk said the north portion of the course is the priority, but studies to be conducted by NAI will help advise the Redevelopment Commission on the best way to go about marketing the property.
“They’re going to help us determine just what interest there is,” he said.
In other business, the Redevelopment Commission hired Griffith-based Weaver Consultants Group to advise on development of a parcel in Buffington Harbor. Weaver already has completed the first phase of work in which it was determined that 5 acres of the 25-acre site contains wetlands.
Redevelopment officials say several business entities are interested in developing the site, which has access to Cline Avenue and the Gary/Chicago International Airport.