Louisville taxpayer costs mount as Urban Government Center deal waits

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) – Cliff Hayden is waiting.

He’s waiting for work to begin next door, where the Urban Government Center site continues to sit vacant. The abandoned buildings are fenced in. The grass grows tall in places. Some windows are boarded up or closed. Others are open.

For Hayden, manager of The Louisville Experience boutique hotel, the slow-going progress on transforming the neighboring property has directly affected his new business formally set to open this month.

“We’ve had theft already. We've had our AC units stolen,” he said, adding that people routinely camp out behind his building. “We’ve got to constantly move people out of the way.”

Proposed seven years ago as a city-guided, privately-run project, Metro government’s plan for more than 10 acres in the Paristown Pointe neighborhood hasn’t yet materialized. As a result, a steady outlay of public funds continues to help maintain the area as a $249 million redevelopment deal awaits its next step.   

Data obtained by WDRB News in an open records request show $231,869 in expenditures on services from security to fence repair during a two-year period between January 2022 and this January. That brings the costs borne by taxpayers to more than $588,000 since 2017.

But that figure is assuredly higher because Metro government wasn’t able to provide data since January. And it also doesn’t include expenses from the largely federally funded Louisville Metro Housing Authority, which WDRB has requested.

The bulk of the Metro funds from 2022 to 2024 covers security at the site – nearly $200,000, or about 86% of all costs in the last two years. Even so, some neighbors question the effectiveness of security patrols and other measures.

Cindy Pablo, who has lived in the area for about three decades, said she often sees looters enter the buildings and steal metal.

Not long ago, she said, she watched a man with five pizzas and bottles of soft drinks walk into the Louisville Metro Housing Authority’s building. “They’re not afraid of anyone,” she said.

“They’re stealing from all the taxpayers,” Pablo said. “What gets me is all of the money that they're ripping out of these buildings, they're selling. And that's something that could have gone back into our community and elsewhere.”

Since 2022, police have made 13 arrests at the site for burglary, trespassing and other offenses, records show.

In one example from April 2023, officers arrived at the Urban Government Center site after private security saw two people breach the city-erected fence and enter the building at 810 Barret Avenue, according to an arrest citation. Pictures showed the men “walking with what looked to be copper pipes.”

After one man was arrested, officers observed “a green backpack full of saws, screwdrivers and other burglary tools.”

That arrest came just hours after police responded to a break in at the adjacent Housing Authority property at 768 Barret, where a man had entered through a window and planned to “cut copper out of the walls,” an arrest report says.

Metro government continues to provide security and oversee most of the site, but the city’s chosen developer, Paristown Preservation Trust, now is responsible for the Housing Authority property as part of a purchase agreement that took effect in February. The sale must close by October.

The agreement would let the housing agency sell the building for $1.7 million. The old Housing Authority of Jefferson County initially bought the property from Jefferson County Fiscal Court in 1992 for $1.2 million.

In a statement, Brian Forrest of Paristown Preservation Trust said his group has been mowing the sidewalks and other parts of the property. “Unfortunately, countless delays have created many questions on who is responsible for caring for the property until it changes hands,” he said. “Our hope is those questions will be answered via Metro Council in June with a vote to move this important redevelopment forward. We are excited to take ownership and then assume full responsibility for the Urban Government Center property.

The developer’s current plans call for 450 apartments, 165,000 square feet of office and commercial space, a 100-room hotel with five condominiums and a parking garage for 150 vehicles, in addition to unspecified green space, according to details presented at an April meeting.

The city’s website now says a conference center also is envisioned.

Paristown Preservation Trust is seeking city approval for a tax increment financing (TIF) district, an estimated $20 million public subsidy that would return a portion of new property tax revenue generated there over 20 years.

Unlike the Housing Authority building and land, the rest of the site would be sold to developers for $1. But to do that, a community benefits agreement must be finalized with neighbors and the city.

Negotiations dating back several years have yet to result in an agreement. The developers did not answer WDRB’s question about their opinion on where that agreement stands.

But Caitlin Bowling, spokeswoman for Metro government’s economic development cabinet, said the neighborhoods group submitted a new proposal to Steve Smith of the development group, but he “doesn’t want to make any adjustments to the community benefits agreement.”

She said Smith’s development team did agree to add a playground and build five additional units of affordable housing.

There are no plans to reconvene the committee, Bowling said.

She said a new proposal pushed by developer Thomas Woodcock and backed by the German-Paristown Neighborhood Association isn’t being considered. That plan would reuse the main building at 810 Barret, turning it into senior apartments, and add an “Olmsted-like” park, grocery store and farmers market.

“Through a combination of housing, amenities, and green initiatives, the New Plan seeks to enrich the quality of life for all community members,” Woodcock wrote in a description of the plan, which he says doesn't need the TIF subsidy.

Meanwhile, for people who live and work nearby, the wait continues.

John Mahorney, who lives across Vine Street from the abandoned buildings, said he’s heard about the new proposal but would rather the current one – from the third development group since 2017 – get done.

“We've come so far already with this other plan,” he said. “Honestly, it's not perfect by any means. But I think once it gets going, we can hold Steve Smith’s feet to the candle a little more.”

Hayden, the boutique hotel manager, said a grand opening is planned for June after a quiet opening for events like the Kentucky Derby and PGA Championship.

“We are hoping that they can just push something through -- whatever they’ve got to do to make some progress on it to get it cleaned up over there.”

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