Fort Myers won't back off finding new police headquarters site
Fort Myers' city manager is not backing away from finding a new site for a new police station headquarters to clear the way for redevelopment of land along Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard from Central Avenue to Fowler Street.
Manager Marty Lawing said a group of city officials is looking for a new site for the headquarters that would open the door to redeveloping the former site of The News-Press into a "Gateway to Midtown."
He dropped in at an open house held by the city last week to seek comment from property owners in the Midtown area proposed for a major revitalization program.
"We wanted feedback from the property owners, ideas on what they want to do," Lawing said.
The Fort Myers Housing Authority has raised the possibility of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development yanking away the funds for a new complex to replace the aged-out Southward Village housing community if the police headquarters is built outside a neighborhood delineated in the HUD grant application.
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Applications submitted by the city and the housing authority for the grant include a map showing a planned police headquarters within a neighborhood that stretches from Southward Village to Central Avenue.
Lawing said Thursday that the city believes a site for the police headquarters can be found elsewhere in the designated neighborhood.
"It does not say you have to be on that News-Press site," Lawing said during a drop-in session at City of Palms Park for property owners in the proposed Midtown development area.
Some council members contend that using the former newspaper property as part of the Midtown development would mean a boost to redeveloping the area.
Related: City eyes former newspaper site as 'Gateway to Midtown'
There has been no confirmation from HUD that another site for police headquarters would jeopardize the grant.
"We don’t know if we can find a site that is perfect," Lawing said. "If it is just on the outside of the line they have drawn, would they amend it? We don't know."
Some interested property owners visited the meeting at the baseball park in the midst of Midtown to get a glimpse of the plans and ask questions.
Several parishioners of St. Francis Xavier Church led by the Rev. Anthony Hewitt were among the visitors.
More than 470,000 square feet connected to the church is owned by the Diocese of Venice in Florida through Bishop Frank Dewane as a "corporation sole" which gives him full authority over the property.
"We have a parish that could withstand an influx of people," Hewitt said. "Our church holds over 1,000 for a service."
The church serves worshippers with Catholic masses in English, Haitian and Polish every weekend.
Like any other property owner, the church leaders want to know more about what will happen to their property if Midtown is rebuilt.
Hewitt said he noted maps that suggest the construction of buildings that might infringe on the parking areas for the church and parochial school. He also is concerned that suggestions that Heitman Street, used by parents to drop off children at the church-operated grammar school, would be widened and its surface replaced with pavers.
"Heitman floods, those pavers would pop right up," he said, keeping an optimistic view of the project in light of housing needs in the area.
"It can be a really good thing for the soul if they do it right, because you are talking about 4,000 housing units," he said. "Is that for people who need affordable housing, where you can have a place where you can go that is safe and get to your job? That changes everything."
Another open meeting for interested members of the community will be held in the next few weeks; the meeting last week was aimed at property owners.
In the meantime, the city will be developing design guidelines for the Midtown project to create a neighborhood unified in its use of the land.
The cornerstones of the project may well be two large building complexes whose prior use has been exhausted.
Lawing said the City of Palms ballpark, formerly used for baseball spring training, and the former News-Press property are "two main catalysts in the Midtown area that we actually control.
"That's a good position to be in," he said. "We want the private property owners to really control this."
This article originally appeared on Fort Myers News-Press: Midtown redevelopment plan gets airing at Fort Myers open house
