After impasse, Olmsted County starts over on plans for Ear of Corn water tower site

ROCHESTER – After talks broke down last month, Olmsted County is no closer to finding a use for the 11-acre site of a former Seneca Foods plant — and the famous Ear of Corn water tower — since purchasing it in 2019.

Indeed, the Olmsted County Board is restarting discussions on what to do with the site, just south of downtown Rochester, after the county spent a majority of 2022 seeking proposals, weighing them and negotiating with a local developer.

Those negotiations hit a snag in a closed meeting in December when commissioners reached an impasse on whether to move forward with Titan Development's proposal, a mixed-use housing and commercial project that could have included a grocery store and pharmacy.

County officials and commissioners say details behind Titan's pitch, as well as specifics on why commissioners couldn't reconcile differing views on how the site should be used, is private information as discussions were held in a closed meeting.

The county partnered with Rochester Area Economic Development Inc. at the beginning of last year to solicit development proposals for the site. Four groups came forward, and commissioners chose Titan's approach in August and asked the developer to flesh out its proposal.

"We were excited to be selected to have the opportunity to negotiate," Andy Chafoulias, Titan CEO, said in a statement. "Our uses for the land would have been meaningful and attractive to the local community. The project would have been influential in generating real estate taxes, sales tax and hundreds of jobs."

The board purchased the site for about $5.6 million almost four years ago with a use in mind — a transportation hub as part of the city of Rochester's planned bus rapid transit line. The city shifted gears on its plans in 2020, moving the line northwest of downtown.

Since then, the property has been vacant while Olmsted County demolished the plant, cleaned up the site and renovated the Ear of Corn tower, which sits on the northern part of the parcel.

"Our goal through this whole process has been to make this site as shovel-ready as possible," said Mat Miller, the county's director of facilities and building operations.

Four of the board's seven commissioners are new this year, giving the county a new chance at redeveloping the site over the next few years.

"There are opportunities there," Commissioner Sheila Kiscaden said. "I think we need to delve deeper into talking with one another and arriving at some consensus."

The Seneca land is just east of a major thoroughfare at Broadway Ave. S. and Hwy. 14 north of Graham Park, which hosts hockey games, the county fair and numerous regional markets and bazaars throughout the year.

The site hosted a food cannery for decades — several companies owned it before Seneca bought it in 1982 — but it was originally part of Graham Park and may be once again.

"That's a fair discussion the board should have," Board Chair Gregg Wright said.

As Wright sees it, the board largely has four options: sell the land to recoup county costs, choose a developer with a specific proposal in mind, keep it for park space or do nothing and sit on the property.

New commissioners appear largely split on the issue based on public comments they made during the 2022 campaign. Laurel Podulke-Smith, who won a seat representing the county's First District, said she still favors using the Seneca site as green space for an urban park.

"It could potentially revitalize that neighborhood," she said. "Public amenities like that just bring so much benefit to a community on so many levels."

First-term commissioners Brian Mueller and Dave Senjem previously advocated selling off the Seneca site for commercial or industrial uses to boost the area's economic development.

Senjem said he'd like to revisit Titan's proposal. Senjem worries the Seneca property is too small and oddly shaped to attract bids from major companies in Minnesota or the U.S.

"I just don't think we're going to get a lot of interest in that site," he said. "And so I'm not so sure we should necessarily discard the offer that we had."