Wilmington City Council members are expected to discuss the potential sale of city-owned parking decks and an office building at 115 N. Third St. next week.

According to agenda documents for the council's meeting Tuesday night, city staff recently received an unsolicited offer of $16 million for the city-owned Market Street deck at 115 Market St., the city's Second Street deck at 114 N. Second St., the five-story office building at 115 N. Third St. and the property at 210 Chestnut St.

The company that made the offer, which was signed on June 6, is Wilmington-based Dinosaur Holdings LLC, managed by Jonathan Cohen, according to agenda documents. The registered agent for Dinosaur Holdings is listed with the state's corporations division as Robbie Parker, an attorney at Lee Kaess law firm in Wilmington. Efforts to reach Parker were not immediately successful Friday afternoon.

City staff isn't recommending the council agree to the sale because the city's elected leaders have not "indicated a desire to sell the majority of the city’s off-street parking capacity in the core central business district, and because the offer, as presented in an upset bid format, is not expected to be the disposition method which would best serve the public by yielding the highest value for the properties, should council desire to sell these parking assets," agenda documents state.

The parking decks would have to be declared surplus property. The council had already declared 115 N. Third St. and 210 Chestnut St. as surplus as a result of the city's purchase of the former PPD campus along North Front Street for city offices. The city intended to sell the two properties, along with others, to offset the cost of the city's $68 million PPD office purchase from Thermo Fisher Scientific.

The city renamed the 12-story former PPD headquarters building Skyline Center and moved city departments to the building in 2023.

Addressing the issue of parking, the agenda documents state there are 1,475 spaces owned or leased by the city for public off-street parking between the river, Third Street, Dock Street and Grace Street.

"Selling both parking decks would result in the sale of 65% (955 spaces) of the City’s off-street capacity. The Market Street Deck, at 566 spaces, represents almost 40% of the core downtown capacity and, as the best located parking structure in the City’s portfolio, acts as both a geographic and financial anchor to the overall parking enterprise," agenda documents state. "Thus far, the city has expended $10 million in debt service payments on the Market Street Deck and the deck presently generates over $300,000 in net proceeds per year, after accounting for debt service."

The Second Street deck has no debt, and the Market Street deck’s debt will be paid off in three years, officials stated.

"The Market Street Deck’s operation is expected to yield $1 million per year in net proceeds at today’s amenity driven, below-market rate structure," they said in the agenda documents.

The city's staff could, however, "support the sale of the 2nd Street Deck, either in tandem with 115 N 3rd Street and 210 Chestnut Street, or separately. After the relocation of employees to the Skyline Center from 305 Chestnut Street, 414 Chestnut Street, 115 N 3rd Street, and Thalian Hall, the lack of City employees using the 2nd Street Deck has left ample vacancy with peak daytime utilization being approximately 50%," according to the agenda documents.

Officials said should the Second Street deck be sold, the current tenants could be accommodated by other city-managed parking options within a two-block distance via the Market Street deck, the parking deck in the mixed-use development River Place on Grace Street and a parking lot on South Second Street.

In the agenda documents, the city staff listed key points of the original offer on the council's agenda. The offer includes:

• $800,000 (5%) earnest money deposit.
• 60-day right-of-entry for due diligence, 30 days to close thereafter.
• Deposit may be returned to Buyer, for any reason or no reason, within 60 days.
• Sold "as-is" and conveyed via special warranty deed.
• Buyer to obtain new loan.
• Leases / license agreements must remain substantially the same, at the sole discretion of the buyer, to affect closing and
• Buyer shall pay buyer's broker fees, if any, pursuant to separate agreement.

The issue is on the agenda for the Wilmington City Council's meeting at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday.