Push For Downtown Club Conversion Continues
The fate of the Downtown Club will be the topic of a public meeting to be held on February 9 during the regularly scheduled joint caucus of City Council. The meeting, initiated by the Homeless ActionCommittee (HAC), will bring together members of City Council, the Washtenaw County Commissioners, the Downtown Development Authority, and several organizations concerned with housing and homelessness.
The Downtown Club, located at 110 N. Fourth Ave., is an office building that now stands over 50% vacant. The building's prior owners declared bankruptcy this fall and it became the property of First of America Bank on December 13. The building was purchased by the Commissioners of Washtenaw County in mid-January for County office use, through the issuance of $2,000,000 in bonds.
The Downtown Club has been the focus of a concerted campaign by HAC throughout this fall and winter involving pickets and demonstrations (which resulted in a total of 19 arrests of demonstrators peacefully occupying the building). The Downtown Club housed low income adults until its conversion to office space in 1983. In light of the dire need for low income housing in Ann Arbor, H AC is advocating that the Downtown Club be returned to its original purpose.
At a January 11 meeting on the Downtown Club, hosted by the Gray Panthers, County Commission Chairperson Mary Lou Murray discussed the financial considerations barring the County from re-converting the building to housing. She estimated that it would cost $551,000 to reconvene the building. Murray projected an annual cost of $250,000 for debt service on renovation and purchase, in addition to $126,000 in annual operating costs.
HAC maintains that housing must be constructed debt-free in order to be affordable to low-income persons. This means that public housing monies must be provided for the original conversión costs. If this were the case, according to the county's figures, the total annual cost to run the building would be $126,000. Assuming, as Murray did, that the building would hold 55 housing units, that cost could be off set by a monthly rent of $190 per tenant.
HAC believes that the housing problem in Ann Arbor will only be tackled when local government bodies prioritize housing. All that is required to take the first step is $55 1,000 and the will to do it. City Council controls a yearly budgetof $126 million. The Downtown Development Authority (the committee appointed by City Council to make improvements to the downtown área) has a budget of over $3 million, and that over $1.5 million in the city's "enterprise fund" was budgeted last year for a golf course. Some of these funds could be directed toward the re -conversion of the Downtown Club.
The County argues that they need the building for office space since it is directly across the street from their current office building. This argument loses validity when one considers the many units of vacant office space within two blocks of their current building and the glut of office space in general, in downtown Ann Arbor. It also appears that if the County is capable of purchasing a $2 million building, they should also find within their budget the funds necessary to begin to address the county's housing crisis.
The meeting to discuss the fate of the Downtown Club will be Sunday, February 9 at 7:30 pm in the City Council Chambers. It is open to the public and anyone concerned about the housing and homelessness problem in Ann Arbor is encouraged to attend. Phillis Engelbert is a member of the Homeless Action Committee and an AGENDA staffer.