Hennepin County is expected to take a big step Tuesday in helping Minneapolis commercial corridors damaged by the riots following the 2020 police killing of George Floyd.
The County Board will vote to use $10 million of American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funding to make investments in 18 redevelopment projects, business accelerators and nonprofits.
The biggest award — $1.5 million — will benefit the $29 million resurrection of the huge, burned-out Coliseum building at E. Lake Street and Minnehaha Avenue, an intersection devastated by arson.
The Coliseum, acquired last year by veteran community developer Seward Redesign, hopes to close on the financing this fall, said Taylor Smrikarova, the organization's property development director. Development partners include Chris Montana, owner of one of the few Black-owned distilleries in the United States; architect Alicia Belton and consultant Janice Downing.
"There's an opportunity to do things differently, to make sure that the community that is there is benefiting from what happens," Belton said recently.
The $10 million is part of a $19 million community investment plan set last fall by the County Board to make longer-term investments to accelerate community development and small-business growth in areas "which historically have experienced disinvestment," said Patricia Fitzgerald, Hennepin County's director of community and economic development.
"Those were the same communities hardest hit by the pandemic," she said. "And the impacts of the civil uprisings. There's also a focus on addressing racial disparities. Many of the projects are led by people of color."
The county's $10 million will help leverage a total of $206 million in mostly private funding for 13 affordable commercial and business-incubator projects, from Bloomington to Brooklyn Park. These in turn will support 550 small businesses and support 760 new or retained jobs. The five nonprofit redevelopment projects, valued at $67.7 million, will support 200 jobs, according to the county.
