Business leaders rally in support of Superman building

MORE THAN 150 PEOPLE packed the inside of the so-called Superman building on Westminster Street on Thursday. Labor and community leaders held a press conference to talk about the redevelopment of the building, which has been vacant for about three years. / PBN PHOTO/ELI SHERMAN
MORE THAN 150 PEOPLE packed the inside of the so-called Superman building on Westminster Street on Thursday. Labor and community leaders held a press conference to talk about the redevelopment of the building, which has been vacant for about three years. / PBN PHOTO/ELI SHERMAN

(Updated, 8:37 p.m.)
PROVIDENCE – It’s not the first time developers of the so-called Superman Building at 111 Westminster St. have sought city and state support to rehabilitate the iconic 26-floor Art Deco Providence office tower.
And it’s not the second.
But developers – determined the time to act is now – are bullish that their third attempt could produce results, as they look to finalize some sort of financing deal before the end of the legislative session. What that deal looks like and what it will cost to renovate the city’s tallest building, however, remains to be seen.
“It will depend on how we repurpose the building,” said David Sweetser, principal of High Rock Westminster Street LLC, which owns the building.
“We are working in partnership with the state and that will have a significant effect on how we proceed further financially,” he added.
Sweetser on Thursday joined more than 150 business and community leaders, public officials and other interested parties to rally support for renovating the tower, which has now sat vacant for three years.
The resonating message among the dozen people who spoke, including Arnold B. “Buff” Chace, of Cornish Associates, Neil D. Steinberg, president and CEO of the Rhode Island Foundation, Providence Mayor Jorge O. Elorza, and Laurie White, president of the Greater Providence Chamber of Commerce, was that there needs to be some sort of public-private partnership in order to successfully renovate the vacant building.
“Taking a wrecking ball to this beautiful, iconic structure would be the metaphorical equivalent of kryptonite to the city and the state’s business attraction and community revitalization effort,” White said, playing off of the structure’s nickname.
The large turnout demonstrated there’s widespread support and interest in revitalization the building, but until a financing package is proposed it will likely be tough for lawmakers to know where they stand in the long run.
“Not knowing what the ask is, I think we have to sit down with all the stakeholders and see what it takes,” said Luis A. Aponte, Providence City Council president. “The question for me is twofold: what does it take and what is that level of investment and the type of investment we want to make?”
In 2013, following a study that estimated the cost of transforming the 1927 building would total $130 million, the developer proposed the state lend support in the form of $39 million in unspecified assistance, $21 million in federal historic tax credits and between $10 and $15 million in city property tax breaks.
One year later, the owner again tried to garner state financing to rehab the tower into a mixed-use project with 280 apartments. The proposal looked similar to the first request.
But to date, the two attempts yielded little-to-no results, despite city and state leaders repeatedly saying publicly that something must be done with the building. Its development team, comprising High Rock, Cornish Associates and a government relations team, has met with R.I. Commerce Corporation for the past four months, according to spokesman William Fischer, which is the quasi-governmental organization in charge with handling the state’s incentive programs. But the meetings have yet to produce any type of proposal.
At the same time, the value of the downtown building, known formally as the Industrial Trust Building, has been reduced nearly in half over the past three years. During the city’s recent revaluation of residential and commercial properties, a contractor set the building at $15.4 million, representing a 46.9 percent decrease from $29 million in 2013.
The development team says it is pushing for something now because it had been tied up in the last year trying to negotiate a deal with Citizens Financial Group Inc. to move its central campus to the Superman Building, but that deal fell through after the Providence-based bank decided to build a new campus in Johnston.
Sweetser has invested about $5 million into the vacant building since 2013 on security, taxes and upkeep, which he says shows that he’s bullish on the future prospects of the building.

But some sort of financial assistance will be necessary to move forward, he added, because there’s a gap in the cost of renovating the building into residential units in Providence compared with other such markets as Boston.
“The cost of the building is virtually [indifferent], yet the rent in Boston is twice the rent in Rhode Island,” he said. “It shows there’s an economic gap created, unfortunately, with today’s construction costs versus today’s rent in the Providence market and you’re not going to be able to make the two ends meet without funding the gap and that’s the challenge that we all have.”
Proponents of the redevelopment would like to see the Superman Building transformed into some type of mixed-use building, which would bring more residents to the downtown and help bolster the spending for businesses in the area. An emotional Chace, who’s heading the redevelopment efforts in Providence, also argued that redeveloping such an iconic piece of real estate in the city’s downtown could go a long way toward lifting the spirit of the city.
“We have to feel good about ourselves and you do that by taking care of the wonderful things that we have in our community,” he said.
Sweetser says detailed numbers are forthcoming and could shake out within the next month, as he hopes to get something passed this legislative session. Senate Majority Leader Dominick J. Ruggerio and Rep. John M. Carnevale both publicly support the project moving forward, but absent from the event were House Speaker Nicholas A. Mattiello, Senate President M. Teresa Paiva Weed and Gov. Gina M. Raimondo. Contacted after the rally, Mattiello told PBN that “there is no proposal on the Superman building before the legislature at this time.”
Regardless, Sweetser believes the timing is now.
“The thing I don’t want to have happen is in five years from now look back and say we had a chance, we could have done something with that building, we had an owner who was ready to do something, we had political figures ready to do something, and for whatever reason we did not,” he said. “That would be a shame.”

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2 COMMENTS

  1. The Citizens Bank effort was based on not getting reality. No business can move into a “not smart” building. A smart building is geared up to handle the huge amount of electricity needed fo today’s business operations., Rewiring that building would cost a fortune an might not work, given how the old wiring is embedded. these realtors need to research why old NY buildings have been abandoned by businesses in favor of new smart buildings.

    The rooms are too small for residential conversion. The walls are too thick for easy, cost effective rehabbing.

    The realtor group and the state will euphorically and grossly underestimate the costs, go ahead, and then either keep poring money in or abandon any further rehabbing.

    An out of state structural engineer needs to analyze the building and estimate costs. Those in RI will be too self-interested to face reality.

    There’s a very good reason the building is empty and neglected.

  2. Just how stupid are the people of Rhode Island? This will be another financial disaster for the taxpayers and a huge win for the developers. Sen. Ruggerio has a clear conflict of interest, but still he is out front leading an unpopular cause. Why? Because no other GA members want to touch such a bad idea.