Tag Archives: Oak Creek postal facility

March 15, 2013 · 5:02 pm

What’s Up With The Van Beck’s Parcel, Anyway?

As an alderman for the district across the street from the large, vacant plot of land on the southwest corner of Nicholson and College Avenues in Oak Creek, I’ve been wondering what’s up there … especially after plans for a new postal facility were put on hold a couple of years ago.

This WISN piece gets to the bottom of it. Sort of.

It calls the postal project “a dead end” and includes comments from Oak Creek Mayor Steve Scaffidi calling for answers.

Scaffidi said the city lost out on the promised jobs and on tax revenue because the Postal Service pays no property taxes.

He wants the post office to either build on the land, which is unlikely, or sell it.

“We’re going to aggressively go after that. We will push the post office to make a decision,” Scaffidi said. “I will say that we will develop that site. Now, what that is? Developers are working on that.”

I’ll keep you posted.

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October 24, 2011 · 4:11 pm

Postal Facility Update And Other Headlines

The U.S. postal facility planned across the street from South Milwaukee’s 4th District may not be a postal facility at all.

That’s according to this story from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. From it:

The Oak Creek Plan Commission, at its Tuesday night meeting, will consider a request to change the development plan to allow for creating an alternate project for the site, said Doug Seymour, community development director.

There are no specific alternatives yet, Seymour said. But it makes sense to begin planning for that possibility given the prospects for the original project, he said.

Seymour said city officials are working with Cobalt and the Postal Service “to try to get something going on that property.” The land, once used for farming, hasn’t been paying property taxes since it was sold to the Postal Service, Seymour said.

The agency hasn’t yet dropped its plans for the site, said Tim Ratliff, a Postal Service spokesman.

“We always like to keep our options open,” he said.

I’ll keep you posted on this story. In the meantime, check out these other local headlines:

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September 21, 2011 · 9:47 pm

Postal Facility Update: Agreement Extended Into 2013

The Oak Creek City Council has given a developer two more years to move ahead with a project at the corners of Pennsylvania and College Avenues.

It just may not be a postal facility.

That’s according to Oak Creek Patch, which has an update on the project. From it:

“The memorandum of understanding passed Tuesday night by the Common Council also allows for the possibility of a different development altogether for those empty 64 acres on the city’s northeast side.

And at this point, that scenario seems far more likely than the original plan for an 800,000-square-foot mail distribution center, proposed in 2008 shortly before the economy faltered. Though the Oak Creek facility was designed to increase efficiency and ultimately save the USPS money – the building would replace the downtown Milwaukee distribution center – the finances simply aren’t there for the postal service to invest in a large construction project.

“The postal service is projected to lose $10 billion this year. They’re closing facilities,” said Scott Yauck of Cobalt Partners, a Milwaukee development firm working on the project, at Tuesday’s council meeting. “There’s benefit of getting out of downtown regardless, (for) operating efficiency, but they don’t have the capital to do those things right now.

“This is really intended to allow for the exploration of other possibilities.”

So, what does this all mean for South Milwaukee and the 4th District, which borders this parcel? Right now, the future of that land (the former Van Beck’s) is uncertain, but this much is clear: The plan to widen Nicholson/Pennsylvania between College and Rawson remains on for 2012 … with no roundabout. And that’s a good thing.

I’ll keep you posted when I learn more.

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