Kaufman Development received approval this week from the Victorian Village Commission to redevelop the former International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers site at 23 W. Second Ave.
If that sounds familiar, it’s because this is not the first time a plan for the site has been approved by the commission.
Kaufman purchased the land in 2016 and returned to the board several times with different designs, responding to concerns raised by some neighbors and commissioners about its size. One of those designs – which called for a building that topped out at nine stories – was approved by the commission in 2017, but Kaufman later scrapped that and came back with significant changes, citing rising construction costs and financing issues. Six months after that, the project was officially on hold, and in late 2018 the site was listed for sale.
The property was not sold, and in February of 2020, Kaufman brought a revised design back to the board. More meetings followed – some of them contentious – leading up to the 4-2 vote on Wednesday to approve a certificate of appropriateness for the project.
The approved plan calls for a seven-story, 166-unit building to be built on what is now primarily an empty field and parking lot between West Second and Price Avenue. Two-story townhomes will front Price and an internal parking garage will serve the project.
Most of the existing IBEW building on West Second will be preserved and used as a restaurant or retail space (previous plans called for a significant portion of it to be demolished).
Asked to comment on what has been a very long approval process, Brett Kaufman, Founder and CEO of Kaufman Development, provided the following statement:
“We are very pleased with the end product and looking forward to starting construction this summer.”