Settlement reached on Carriage City

The Redevelopment Agency last night approved a settlement with Carriage City Properties (CCP) that will allow the developer to continue to rent unsold units at the 16-story condo/hotel.

CCP has sold about 57 units and began marketing vacant units for rent as early as last fall. Five are occupied by tenants and the city has issued 76 temporary Certificates of Occupancy in all at the 222-unit complex.

The two sides have been in discussions since the Agency declared CCP in default of its redevelopment agreement two months ago.

Here’s a summary of the settlement:
* CCP will execute a note and mortgage to secure the outstanding $2,285,250 in development fees and purchase price payments. The agency will get 10 percent of rent from each rented unit, which will be deducted from the $13,850 development fee until the unit is sold, at which time CCP will pay the balance. There are 165 remaining units.

* Infrastructure improvements, namely the East Milton Avenue and Irving Street realignment, cost approximately $1 million, of which CCP was liable for $368,562. The agency accepted CCP’s offer of $150,000, to be released immediately.

* Professional fees of $19,913 and water connection fees of $71,981 owed by CCP will be paid no later than April 1, 2010.

* Construction permit violations totaling $168,000 will be waived upon abatement of all issues identified by the city’s construction official.

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5/17 UPDATED: Between the intersection improvements and construction penalties waived upon correction, CCP got about 15 percent knocked off what it owed in total. City Administrator and Redevelopment Director Peter Pelissier described that as “small to the potential of a bankrupt redeveloper,” adding that the site pays almost $1 million in property taxes. Meanwhile, construction penalties usually are waived if violations are corrected as a matter of business, with the point to get conformance and have the building safe for occupancy.

Many builders, renters and retailers are trying to renegotiate contracts to stay solvent, he said. “This is no different. The RRA and the city need to work together with redevelopers and sometimes although not popular with the critics public improvements not private improvements have to be paid for by the taxpayer to receive acceptable returns.” While CCP has taken a lot of heat for not adhering to the redeveloper’s agreement, Pelissier said, they did complete construction.

Hotel tax revenue spikes

The city realized about $22,000 more than originally budgeted for hotel tax revenues in the $42-million municipal budget that was passed last month.

The city collected $58,000 in hotel tax revenue, about 61 percent more than the $36,000 originally planned in the 2009 budget, which ends June 30. Sixth Ward Councilman Samson Steinman confirmed the increase with the city administration during last month’s public hearing on the budget. He attributed the boost in revenue from about three months of operation by Hotel Indigo at SkyView, as well as the new Best Western on Paterson Street, off Routes 1&9.

The state imposes a 5-percent hotel tax and municipalities are allowed to impose an additional levy of their own of as much as 3 percent. The hotel tax was created during the McGreevey administration in 2003 and Rahway enacted the local tax effective Nov. 1, 2003.

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Elizabeth Avenue supermarket changes hands

News has been a little slow of late so I’ve been perusing property transactions in Rahway and came across this one.

Universal Meat Supermarket on Elizabeth Avenue sold for $3.195 million in January, according to PropertyShark.com. V&D Properties, which lists the supermarket as its address, 2325 Elizabeth Ave. (Block 273/Lot 2), bought the 2.155-acre property from a Linden-based entity called Mia Tierra Linda, Inc., which acquired the site in October 2002 for $2.128 million. (That’s $1.067 million more, or 50 percent, in about 6 years and 3 months, for those of you scoring at home.)

The 32,000-square-foot building was built in 1963, according to land records, and is assessed at about $1.45 million, for property taxes of almost $69,000.

That’s outrageous, I won’t pay

If the latest poll results are any indication, there must be about four blood relatives or close friends who read the blog…

“Would you pay a subscription fee to access Rahway Rising?”
You mean you’d pay me, right? 70 percent (46/65)
How’s a dollar a month sound? 20 percent (13/65)
Name a price — it wouldn’t be enough! 6 percent (4/65)
A buck a week is as high as I’d go; 3 percent (2/65)
$1 per blog post; 0 percent (0/65)

As I mentioned earlier, there are no plans to start a subscription fee for the blog, the latest poll was more a curiosity for me than anything. There are other ways to monetize a blog, through other forms of advertising, but alas, there are only 24 hours in a day and only one of me so I also have no plans to start selling ads in all my spare time. As of today, Rahway Rising is worth anywhere from $222 to $1,693.62, at least according to two site calculators. Sweet.

Here’s another piece I stumbled upon about the future of newspapers and online journalism, which is sort of what prompted my original poll question.

I’ll be taking suggestions for the next blog poll, always looking for ways that readers can be interactive if they don’t feel like commenting. Past suggestions included “Best dry cleaners” and “Best Chinese takeout” in town. Whaddaya think?