The city of Fort Myers plans to vote Jan. 21 on whether to meet March 3 to consider Catalyst Community Development LLC as the buyer for almost 10 acres at 2442 Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., former site of The News-Press.
Catalyst submitted an unsolicited bid of $11.5 million.
As that became public record, another suitor for the land formally notified the city of a second bid, sending a letter to city officials on the afternoon of the vote, hoping to also be considered as a buyer for The News-Press site.
Brian Freeman, a Fort Myers attorney and longtime area land investor, recently formed Freeman Fort Myers LLC, hiring fellow Fort Myers attorney Sawyer Smith to pitch a competing bid on the property.
Freeman is offering $13.25 million — $1.75 million more than Catalyst — with a $325,000 deposit and additional $325,000 at the end of due diligence.
Neither Catalyst Asset Management President Joe Bonora nor Freeman participated in the request for proposal two years ago, which yielded two potential buyers. The city selected Tre Bel Housing, backed by former NFL player Jonathan Vilma, but the company’s plans to develop fell short of meeting the financial thresholds to proceed.
The city paid $8.9 million for the site in 2019, and it has been empty ever since.
Catalyst, which developed City Walk apartments off First Street near downtown Fort Myers and is finishing the 321-unit Montage at Midtown by the end of this year, plans to build at least 600 apartment units at the News-Press site. That would be supplemented with up to 50,000 square feet of retail space, up to 150,000 square feet of office, a 140-to-160-room hotel, a 24,000 square foot grocery store, two parking garages and a public gathering place.
“Two years ago, I was trying to get Montage, the one we’re building now, out of the ground,” Bonora said. “I’ve been very careful about not overextending myself. We didn’t have the bandwidth at the time to take the project on. Then, the timing wasn’t right. The opportunity came back up. The timing worked out better for us this time.”
This would mark Bonora’s first true mixed-use project, which is why he enlisted Jeff Speck as a planner for it.
Speck, the author of Walkable City: How Downtown Saves America, One Step at a Time, has helped design multifamily communities in Lowell, Massachusetts; Memphis, Tennessee; Grand Rapids, Michigan; and Tampa.
“I truly believe in being an expert in something and finding experts in the other areas,” Bonora said. “I don’t develop office. I don’t develop hotels. So, to do it, we would partner with other developers and operators of those types of properties. We would have partners on the other pieces of it.”
City leaders, such as Mayor Kevin Anderson and City Council member Lin Bochette, in separate interviews, said the Bonora/Catalyst plan looked impressive. At the time of those interviews, they did not know yet of Freeman’s bid.
“Joe Bonora is a known factor,” Bochette said. “He builds quality, and he gets things done quickly. He really looked at the full picture of what it means to plan a town center. He’s looking at a resource to enhance the quality of life in the area. That’s not what the police station would have done. That’s not what the cheap apartments would have done.”
Bonora’s offer helps the city monetarily in the short term, plus long-term sustainability for the future, Anderson said.
“Let me say this,” Anderson said. “I think it is crucial that we get the right project there. Because this is a catalyst for Midtown. We’ve got to do this correctly, to make sure we do this right. If we do it right, we will set our tax base that will help the long-term sustainability of the city. We could wind up with Midtown being a burden as opposed to being an asset.”
The Freeman plan would bring a bigger return to the city in terms of up-front financing, Smith said. It also could take more time to develop but with an even greater long-term payoff, he said.
“What we believe is that it should be a true mixed-use project with commercial, retail and residential space,” Smith said. “But until a genuine market study is conducted to determine what the community needs, what the area can sustain and what works best synergistically with the City of Palms redevelopment project, there’s no honest way to determine unit count, unit mix, retail space, commercial space and the overall needs of the site.
“To support that proposition, Mr. Freeman has committed in a not-to-exceed amount of $175,000 to be used for a market conditions study, community needs analysis and bringing in experts to guide not only the development but the city in the goal of using this space to overcome the longstanding divide between Dunbar and downtown Fort Myers.”
The railroad tracks that cut across Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard and Fowler Street have long symbolized the historical racial divides in Fort Myers, Smith said.
“Inclusive in these studies will be how we can overcome the 1,050 feet containing high-speed traffic lanes and a railroad track that has historically served as a dividing line between Dunbar and downtown — which must be removed.”
