Holy Cross School Site Plans Dealt a Setback (via Times-Picayune)

The Times-Picayune this morning reported on a setback to plans coordinated jointly by a team of developers (including Green Coast Enterprises and actor Wendell Pierce) and Lower 9th Ward residents to redevelop the old Holy Cross School property into a multi-use project complete with a green grocery and urban farm.

By Frank Donze, The Times-Picayune

Citing their inability to line up financing, developers have scrapped a proposal to buy the shuttered Holy Cross School campus and bring a full-service supermarket and affordable housing for teachers to the Lower 9th Ward site. A team led by New Orleans-based Green Coast Enterprises signed an agreement to buy the 16-acre tract last year. But the group notified the school's real estate agent recently that it would not be able to meet a late January deadline to finalize the purchase.

David da Cunha, the Property One broker representing Holy Cross, said Friday that the developers were attempting to cobble together several sources of funding, including a loan from a City Hall-administered program set up to provide residents with greater access to healthful food choices.

"It proved to be too slow of a process for them, " da Cunha said, "so they decided to pull out. It was a business decision they had to make.''

Green Coast officials couldn't be reached for comment Friday.

Holy Cross officials, who moved the school to a new home in Gentilly two-and-a-half years ago, announced last spring that they were looking for a buyer for the old campus.

Property One established an asking price of $2.1 million for the entire site, including several parcels adjacent to or near the campus.

Site may be broken up

While the school still would prefer a single transaction, da Cunha said there now "may be an opportunity to carve out some of the pieces and sell it less than whole." READ MORE >>

via www.nola.com

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