Logan City officials took yet another step toward replacing the aging Cache Valley Mall with a brand new development, complete with a “big box store” and hundreds of new apartments.
The Cache Valley Marketplace project would replace the Cache Valley Mall with a large, mixed-use development that would include 346 housing units and a 156-room hotel with commercial space on the ground floor. The development would be centered around a 148,000 square foot “big box” anchor store, which has not been announced.
Last week, the Logan Redevelopment Agency — which consists of members of the Logan Municipal Council — unanimously passed a resolution that allows the project’s developers to forgo paying up to $10 million through property tax increment financing. Tax increment financing is a subsidy that allows future property tax increases, up to a certain amount, to be diverted back to a project’s developers. The property tax base remains the same during that time.
In addition to passing the tax increment, the resolution also says Logan City will either pay or waive other fees of up to $3.8 million. This includes waiving around $2.5 million in fees and paying up to $800,000 in contingent legal fees.
Woodsonia Real Estate, a company based in Nebraska that is set to carry out the project, will also receive up to $1.18 million in affordable housing reserves from the city’s redevelopment agency, plus $500,000 from the city’s affordable housing reserve, according to the resolution.
Kirk Jensen, Logan’s economic development director, said during the meeting that passing the resolution would greatly benefit the city, including the strengthening of the area’s tax base and a boost in new and affordable housing.
“Some of the public benefits, just to summarize there: first, revitalization of an underutilized site, obviously through property taxes and sales taxes," Jensen said during the meeting. "The tax base is strengthened. New jobs will be an obvious outcome.”
It’s not exactly clear when the mall could be torn down, but demolition could start sometime in the spring.
