City and Private Investors to Pump $6 million into Various Shopping Centers

City council OKs money for shopping centers

By LAURA GRAFF | Winston-Salem Journal
Published: May 17, 2011

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Five shopping centers around Winston-Salem will be rehabilitated and given face-lifts by private investors and the city, the Winston-Salem City Council agreed last night.
The council voted unanimously to spend about $2.8 million to improve the shopping centers: Ogburn Station off Liberty Street; West Salem on Peters Creek Parkway; Peachtree on Waughtown Street; King Plaza on Waughtown Street; and the shopping center at the intersection of Cherry Street and Polo Road.
The money is coming from the incentive funds Dell Inc. gave back to the city after closing its computer-assembly plant on Temple School Road last year.
"This is our effort to improve the opportunities for small businesses, especially in existing business areas in the core of our city that have been in decline," said council member Dan Besse, who represents the city's Southwest Ward. "We're leveraging public and private investment in those areas of our community that are in need and can benefit," Besse said.
The plan approved by the council includes about $3 million in private investment for the shopping centers. In addition to the $2.8 million city investment, the city will also issue about $550,000 in loans to the shopping centers.
The plan approved by the council on Monday is part of a city program, Revitalizing Urban Commercial Areas, which started in May 2005. The council then agreed to spend $1.5 million to improve three parts of the city: the intersection of Waughtown Street and Thomasville Road, the intersection of Liberty and 14th streets, and the Washington Park and Acadia neighborhoods.
Until the Dell Inc. repayment, funding for the program had run out.
Dell repaid about $15.5 million to the city in November 2009. A little more than $4 million remains from the money Dell paid back.
King Plaza will receive the most money — about $2.2 million in private investment and $800,000 from the city.
"What we will see from this will be dollars generated back throughout the community," said council member and mayor pro tempore Vivian Burke, who represents the city's Northeast Ward.
The city received proposals for redevelopment plans for six shopping centers, according to the city's business development office.
The plan for the sixth shopping center — Northside on Patterson Avenue in northern Winston-Salem — included no private investment. That plan was not approved.

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