$11 Million Agri-Hub, Hotel, More In Works

Edition of: June 6, 2014

By JIM KEVLIN

City Hall’s plans for this round of state economic-development funding include a multi-phased concept to convert downtown Oneonta into an artisanal food and beverage hub, including a “very upscale” boutique hotel.
The city is seeking $11 million grants over the next month to move the plans forward. “There’s an awful lot going on,” said Mayor Dick Miller. “It’s very exciting. Right now, the devil is in the details, and we’re trying to put as much detail into it as we can.”

The two central components are:
• An $8-9 million redevelopment of the former Oneonta Ford Sales building at Chestnut and Market into a farmers’ market/natural foods processing center, perhaps with housing on a new top floor.

• $50,000 for a feasibility study for the boutique hotel, 40-50 rooms, in the lot between Foothills and Ristorante Stella. The hotel would pick up on the food and beverage theme.

But the grant applications, due June 16 and 30 respectively, would include multiple initiatives — implementing the downtown streetscape plan, linking Neahwa Park to the Susquehanna riverfront trails, beautifying the parking deck — that would reinvent center city as a magnet for artisanal food and beverage tourism.

City Hall is taking the lead on these ideas, but the Otsego County IDA, under the new leadership of Sandy Mathes, the “single point of contact” for economic development, is seeking $50,000 for a feasibility study for the redevelopment of the D&H yards and land at the Oneonta Municipal Airport to accommodate businesses whose employees would feed into these initiatives, according to Miller.

The farmers’ market/natural foods processing center — the former Ford dealership is now owned by the Twelve Tribes, operators of the Yellow Deli — might well spinoff a butcher shop, a fish market and the like. Already, the Green Earth natural foods market is working on launching Otsego Fresh, an online natural-food ordering system based on Schoharie Fresh in Cobleskill, Miller said.

The mayor said the center of development is a triangle formed by Main, Market and the Chestnut Street extension. Market Street in particular, he said, has evolved from abandoned mills to “a very attractive set of renovated brick buildings” – apartments, Stella Luna, Foothills Performing Arts Center and the open parking area behind the Clarion Hotel.

The $11 million is being sought through two programs: The CFA (for consolidated funding application) administered by the Mohawk Valley Regional Economic Development Council, the CDBG (community block grant programs), federal money that passes through the MVREDC. The first grant applications are due June 16; the second, June 30.

The CDB grants would used to study the feasibility of the hotel ($50,000), implementing the streetscape plan ($400,000), extending the micro-enterprise grants ($200,000, with individual grants up to $35,000), and the Neahwa Park work ($400,000).

The CDBG money would be for the drainage required for the hotel ($400,000) and the airport/railyard study ($50,000).

Miller, Mathes, City Manager Mike Long, Community Development Director Jeff House and grants consultant Bernie Thoma are doing the applications.