A handful of major developments in the past 12 months, including some small failures and some big gambles, give us hope that downtown Denver will rise to its former glory.
Alterra Mountain Company is moving its headquarters to a city-owned building (formerly owned by The Denver Postap parent company) that has struggled to rent its office space.
The 16th Street rebuild is complete, and free buses are running seamlessly again from Civic Center to Union Station.
The University of Colorado Denver bought prime real estate needed to help fill vacant commercial space on the mall.
And the Downtown Denver Development Authority purchased the struggling Denver Pavilions.
None of these projects are happening by accident. The City of Denver, led by Mayor Mike Johnston’s vision to anchor each block of downtown with an attraction, is engaging in a concerted effort to attract investors.
In total, tax revenue flowing into the Downtown Denver Development Authority (DDDA) . Voters approved a plan to allow the authority to retain tax increment financing in 2024, and now those investments are taking shape.
The area from Union Station to Civic Center Park — often called the Central Business District or midtown — has failed to recover from the COVID work-from-home exodus that devastated our skyscrapers and the businesses that depend on weekday workers.
Desperate times require drastic measures, and this city’s beating heart cannot be allowed to fail. It is through that lens that we now applaud a level of public investment and corporate incentives that we would otherwise be uncomfortable with.
But we urge caution. The DDDA must remember that it is using a finite resource — taxpayer money. Being good stewards of that money is not only essential to the success of their mission, but taxpayers are watching and keeping tabs. Future voters will take note of how these deals play out.
Just last month, an experimental theater closed its doors without ever putting on a show, taking with it a $400,000 taxpayer-funded loan from the DDDA that will likely never be repaid.
The list of positive advances, however, is longer than the list of setbacks.
Alterra Mountain Company announced plans on Thursday to move its headquarters from its existing space in the hip RiNo neighborhood to the old Denver Post building, where the central business district meets Civic Center Park.
The deal – brokered with about $11 million in city and state incentives and loans – only makes sense under the condition that Alterra was considering moving its headquarters to Utah and the money from the DDDA and the state helped inspire the company to stay. We don’t like this arms race of corporate handouts, but we understand why the city must play it at this juncture of history.
The ski company will be an anchor for the southern end of the newly revitalized 16th Street, which, at least for now, has a continuous free shuttle running from the Civic Center transit hub northwest to Union Station. Alterra, which operates the IKON ski pass, and plans to move into the building at 101 W. Colfax Ave. in about a year.
Alterra’s chairman said during an interview Wednesday with The Denver Post that part of what sealed the deal was the vision of the state’s second-largest ski company becoming a part of the city’s civic fabric. We are excited to see how this vision plays out — a sledding hill in Civic Center Park, snowmaking on the now empty gravel pit near the transit hub, or some other urban nod to our mountain sports.
One medium-sized company that only requires employees in office a few times a week moving its headquarters two miles to a new building, isn’t going to fix everything overnight. Downtown is plagued by vacant commercial real estate, skyscrapers selling for pennies on the dollar and a general lack of foot traffic for businesses. There is still open drug use happening on the streets and close to the city’s homeless shelters, large groups gather during the days.
But the Alterra deal comes on the heels of another big announcement. Just as Rock Bottom Brewery announced it was closing its flagship location on 16th Street, the University of Colorado Denver announced it was buying the entire city block that the restaurant called home, including the 25-story tower on Independence Plaza.
The Denver Downtown Development Authority kicked in $4.5 million to help CU Denver buy the property for a total of $28 million. The DDDA is going to launch a small business startup lab in the building, focusing on helping local entrepreneurs build their businesses.
To get a feel for how dire things had become in the area, Independence Plaza last sold for $144 million in 2007.
The DDDA also spent $37 million last year to buy Denver Pavilions, which is located about halfway between CU Denver’s new campus building and Alterra’s new headquarters. The mall has struggled to keep big-name tenants. At its height, the mall offered retail stores and restauarants that themselves were attractions. Now it is being carried by a movie theater.We are glad that the DDDA is keeping the mall afloat until customers and tenants return, but we are skeptical about plans to pour millions more into the outdoor mall to reconfigure it and add condominiums on surface parking lots behind the mall.
Finally, the Denver Police Department is working hard to reduce crime in the area. The DDDA gave the department $10.7 million in grants for 10 officer patrols on foot, on bikes and on horses. Denver Police Chief Ron Thomas said calls for service are down sharply along 16th Street, as are arrests. Thomas said his officers are increasing their enforcement of laws, including arrests for drug-related activity in the area.Denver still has a long way to go to get back to the pre-COVID baseline, but with a half-billion dollars, a workable plan of attack and good stewardship of taxpayer money, this city will survive these downtimes.
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