Ryan
Bandy, owner of Club Station House, says he has a July 31 closing date to sell the
site of Springfield’s oldest gay bar to developers of a proposed hotel.
Bandy
said that he has identified a site downtown that he declined to identify for the
bar’s new home. “The lease is going to be contingent on the building sale going
through,” Bandy said. “It could fall through at the last minute.”
But
Bandy said that he has no reason to doubt that a purchase agreement reached
last spring will be consummated by month’s end. The developers could not be
immediately reached for comment.
The
city council last spring approved $7.65 million of tax-increment financing
money to subsidize the hotel project. Most of the money would be paid out over
years, with $450,000 reserved for property acquisition. In addition to land
where Club Station House now is located on the 300 block of Washington Avenue, a
city-owned parking garage would be razed and turned over to the developer. The
price tag for the project, which will include a bowling alley and apartments in
addition to hotel rooms, has morphed from $56 million when the city council approved
the deal to nearly $74 million last month, when city and county officials held
a hearing on tax exemptions for construction costs.
Ward
5 Ald. Andrew Proctor said he’s not surprised that a building sale is going through
months before a deadline set by the city for early next year, when the
developer is supposed to demonstrate that construction financing has been arranged.
City officials say that no city money will be released for the property purchase
until the developer has secured financing.
“From
the beginning, I always thought this thing was going to go through,” Proctor
said. “I’ve not seen anything that would hold this project up.”
Bandy
said he plans to close the bar on July 28. “I’m hoping to get everything finalized
and figured out and opened within a few weeks at a new location,” he said. He
added that he’s planning a closing party for the bar on July 27, a Saturday.
“We’re
going to have a big blow-out show,” he
said.
Contact
Bruce Rushton at brushton@illinoistimes.com.
This article appears in Jul 18-24, 2019.
