Photo provided An overhead view of the low-head dam in the East Fork White River which would be removed as part of the proposed Riverfront Project.
The Columbus Redevelopment Commission and Columbus City Council on Tuesday held a special joint meeting on Tuesday to hear updates on a proposed riverfront redevelopment between the Second and Third Street bridges.
The joint meeting came as city officials hope to move forward with the estimated $14 million project, which seeks to address safety issues related to the deteriorating low-head dam in the East Fork White River without damaging wetlands located upstream or impacting the river water level through Mill Race Park.
In addition, the project is expected to safeguard the riverbanks from ongoing erosion, including on the west side of the river near the Third Street bridge, which was the site of a landfill from 1938 to 1966 that is believed to have accepted 3.46 million gallons of industrial wastes, including solvents, bases, paints and heavy metals, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
City officials also have proposed building overlooks of the river, connections with the People Trail system and an in-water recreation area, branding the project as an effort to “create an iconic riverfront experience that improves safety.”
On Tuesday, city officials heard presentations from officials with Hitchcock Design Group and consulting group J.S. Held, who provided updates on the project, and officials from James Lima Planning + Development, who presented an analysis on the city’s potential return on investment.
The redevelopment commission heard a similar presentation last month. No decisions were made during Tuesday’s meeting.
The updates included estimated costs for the proposed project, which have climbed to $14 million due to increased construction and labor costs, as well as additional costs associated with environmental mitigation requirements imposed by state and federal regulators, officials said.
The project has had estimated price tags ranging from $8.6 million and $8.9 million in the past.
The funding for the project is expected to come from a variety of sources, including $2.43 million in confirmed funding from state grant programs, Duke Energy and the Columbus Park Foundation, officials said. That would leave about $11.58 million that the city would need for the project.
In 2022, the riverfront project received a $1.72 million Next Level Trail grant from the Indiana Department of Natural Resources and a $600,000 READI grant, a multi-million-dollar regional grant program in Indiana that is funded through the American Rescue Plan.
City officials said previously that they plan to use Central Tax Increment Financing (TIF) district funds to bankroll the project. A TIF district is a mechanism that allows the commission to siphon off increasing property taxes generated on commercial and industrial properties in a selected area to fund projects. TIF funds must be used for economic development or investment in infrastructure.
However, the project’s final price tag could end up being somewhat lower, as officials have included a $3 million contingency into the estimated costs in case unanticipated costs arise during the project.
An economic analysis by James Lima Planning + Development presented during the meeting predicts that the project will contribute to greater economic output and net new tax revenue during construction and after the project is completed.
The estimated short-term benefits of the project, referring to benefits during the project’s construction, include the creation of 116 jobs and economic output of $19 million and $100,000 in local tax revenue and $280,000 in state tax revenue, according to the analysis.
Over the long-run, the project is expected to attract visitors and yield annual economic dividends, including money spent on local goods and services such as food, retail, hospitality, entertainment and transportation, the analysis states.
The long-term economic benefits of the project are estimated to include nine to 32 jobs per year, an economic output of $589,000 to $2 million per year, annual local tax revenue of $16,000 to $56,000 and annual state tax revenue of $31,000 to $108,000, accord go the analysis, which officials aid was based on “conservative baseline assumptions.”
“People in the region (will be) more likely to spend more time in Columbus, spending money on food and beverage, hospitality, entertainment, transportation, which generates not just more activation and visitation, but increases jobs, taxes and sales,” said James Lima, president of James Lima Planning + Development, during the meeting.
Since 2018, the project has gone through several rounds of discussions with regulators, including some agencies that told The Republic previously that the permitting process was taking longer than usual because they were not used to looking at installing recreational features in rivers as part of a dam-removal project.
Until recently, officials had been navigating a maze of regulatory hurdles in which four environmental regulators — the Indiana Department of Natural Resources, Indiana Department of Environmental Management, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency — needed to sign off the project before bids can go out and construction can start.
One of the final hurdles included getting approval from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which had requested input from the EPA, city officials said previously. The Louisville Division of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers told The Republic on Tuesday that it had approved a permit that would allow the city to proceed with the project on Sept. 21.
However, the project is not yet a done deal, officials said.
The Columbus Redevelopment Commission and the Columbus City Council still need to sign off on the proposed project, including the updated estimated costs, Pope said.
The redevelopment commission plans to consider approving funding for the project during its Nov. 20 meeting, Pope said previously. If the commission approves the funding, the project would head before the city council on Dec. 5, as council approval is required for expenditures that exceed $500,000.
Should the council approve of the funding, city officials hope to have a construction manager in place by the end of the year and potentially break ground on the project in the spring.
“I would hope to break ground in the spring,” city redevelopment director Heather Pope said previously. “…I know that might be a little bit lofty, but we’re going for it. …And then it’d be about an 18-month-long process to construct all of the necessary improvements.”
