The Wilmington City Council voted on Tuesday to turn down a $16 million bid for a city-owned office building and two downtown parking decks, as they wait for updated property appraisals.
City leaders, however, declared one of the properties – a parking deck at 114 N. Second St. – as surplus property and asked staff to take a closer look at downtown parking and how it could tie into future development in the area.
The city received an unsolicited offer in June of $16 million for the Second Street parking deck at 114 N. Second St., the Market Street deck at 115 Market St., a five-story office building at 115 N. Third St. and property at 210 Chestnut St.
Combined, the properties cover roughly 2.4 acres, have more than 330,000 square feet and have a tax appraisal of $18.2 million, Aubrey Parsley, the city’s director of economic development, told the council on Tuesday.
Parsley said the 50,765-square-foot office on Third Street has “little to no” usage by the city, and the Second Street parking deck has been underutilized since the city consolidated its offices into the Skyline Center campus.
Chance Dunbar, Wilmington’s director of parking and downtown services, said the 391-space Second Street parking deck had good usage – around 85% at weekday peaks – before the COVID-19 pandemic.
But shifts to remote or hybrid work and the city’s office consolidation have led to a dip in usage. Current weekday peak usage sits at about 52% with peak weekend usage at about 37%, Dunbar told the council.
Parsley said city staff supported declaring the Second Street parking deck as surplus because of that underutilization and because they believe current users could be accommodated in other city-owned decks.
But, ultimately, staff recommended against accepting the $16 million bid because it included the Market Street deck, Parsley said.
“The introduction of Market Street substantially changes the proposition in staff’s view,” Parsley said. “Market Street deck … financially stabilizes our enterprise fund. The two decks together represent 65% of the city-owned parking capacity in the core of our (Central Business District).”
The 570-space deck is expected to bring in $7 million in revenue over the next 10 years, Dunbar told the council.
Wilmington-based Dinosaur Holdings LLC made the unsolicited bid for the properties. The limited liability corporation is managed by Jonathan Cohen, according to agenda documents, and the registered agent is Robbie Parker, an attorney at Wilmington’s Lee Kaess law firm.
Spruill Thompson, senior vice president with Cape Fear Commercial, represented the bidder at the meeting. City council member Charlie Rivenbark, also a senior vice president at Cape Fear Commercial, recused himself from a vote on the bid.
Thompson told the council that the prospective buyers don’t want to redevelop the downtown parking decks but instead are looking to buy them and restructure the parking programs. Thompson said the city’s ongoing efforts to get updated appraisals on the property “makes sense” and said the bidder would be interested in coming back to the city once the appraisals are complete.
The appraisals are underway and should wrap up in the next 30 to 45 days, city manager Tony Caudle said.
“Right now," Caudle said, "we just don’t believe that the value being offered is equal to the assets."
