Residents continue to raise concerns about the proposed redevelopment of the former Walmart at 5825 W. Hope Ave. in Midtown Center.
During a seven-hour meeting filled with public testimony on Monday, many speakers said they opposed the project.
Among the items discussed was approval to deviate from zoning standards established by the Midtown Center Development Incentive Zone to allow an indoor self-storage facility and a 10,000-19,000 square-foot “computational research facility” to be built.
If approved, the second resolution would allow physical changes to the property.
The front of the building would include space for a new location for the Capitol branch of Milwaukee Public Library and other community space that could be used by the City of Milwaukee.
Residents air their concerns
Speakers expressed concerns about the environmental impact and raised transparency concerns about whether the proposed data processing, computer service and computational research facility was, in fact, a small-scale data center.
A handful of residents said they supported the community spaces and overall vision for bringing the redevelopment to the shopping center.
In the end, the City Plan Commission voted to delay making a decision on the proposed items until a future meeting, though they did not specify when.
“I understand the want to develop it now, but this seems to be rather short-sighted and lacks the professional acumen I know that the City of Milwaukee can bring to a project,” said Nathan Coe, who lives on Sherman Boulevard near Capitol Drive.
The commission already approved a related affordable housing project being developed by Gorman & Company in the parking lot north of the building in April.
In response to public outcry, Ald. Mark Chambers Jr. hosted three public informational meetings, two in-person and one virtual session, with Trent Overhue, the property owner and developer from AFS Milwaukee LLC, and city planning staff before the hearing.
“He may not get everything he wants, we may not get everything we want, but we feel that the residents deserve a strong opportunity to revitalize a blighted area,” Chambers said.
City recommends conditions
Tanya Fonseca, city planning director for the Milwaukee Department of City Development, recommended the commission approve the site redevelopment. She said her department’s staff believes the project meets criteria and mitigates community concerns about negative environmental or neighborhood impacts through the plan and 12 proposed conditions.
These conditions include specific limits on power and generator use and requiring a projected sound study and additional sound study within 90 days of the facility’s start of operations to check if it is meeting standards.
The commissioners discussed adding more conditions, such as requiring an independent study be completed of one of the developer’s existing computational research facilities.
“We do now know that there are some similar-type facilities in other places,” said Stephanie Bloomingdale, chair of the commission. “And it would be good to know, what does it sound like outside of those places?”
A motion to approve the proposal with the commission’s additional conditions failed, and a motion to hold the decision until the independent study of a similar facility and solar feasibility study were completed also failed.
Overhue said his companies would run facilities
Overhue said he owns the companies that would be operating the self-storage facility and the computational research facility.
“The way that it works, we have certain contracts with medical companies that will house their equipment with our infrastructure, and they utilize that for their research platforms,” he said.
He said he could not reveal the entity the facility would provide services to because of nondisclosure agreements.
Mabel Lamb, executive director of the Sherman Park Community Association, said residents want to know who would run it. Layfayette Crump, commissioner of city development, said the city does not demand other businesses to share who their clients are and doing so in this case would be unfair.
Overhue told the commission that his goal would be for the facility’s approximately 15 technical and support positions to be hired locally and trained by existing staff.
Commissioner Catrina Crane said she felt conflicted about the proposal because she wants to see change in the area, but wants it to reflect community input.
“I want to do this in an environmentally friendly way for my area, the area that I grew up in,” she said.
Meredith Melland is the neighborhoods reporter for the Milwaukee Neighborhood News Service and a corps member of Report for America, a national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on under-covered issues and communities. Report for America plays no role in editorial decisions in the NNS newsroom.
Jonathan Aguilar is a visual journalist at Milwaukee Neighborhood News Service who is supported through a partnership between CatchLight Local and Report for America.
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