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2017 — 2020
At pointer size, by design: The fight over redeveloping the old General Electric campus is told whole in the heritage record; the controversies ledger carries its civic shape. The city bought the campus from GE in 2017 for $5.5 million; the development agreement with RTM Ventures was extended five times; in April 2020 fifty prominent citizens wrote against a fifth extension. The Redevelopment Commission then voted unanimously to terminate the agreement and pull $62 million in public funding, the city saying RTM was short some $30 million in construction-loan commitments and some $21 million in private equity. The project looked dead. On 23 October 2020 a preliminary agreement brought the Model Group in as co-developer and Tim Ash as investor and general partner; a revised agreement followed, and the project proceeded — Phase 1 opened in 2023. Few development fights anywhere run the full arc in three years: deal, collapse, public money withdrawn, new partners, opening.
Sources:
- Indianapolis Business Journal, 2017 — the $5.5 million purchase from GE.
- The heritage record, Historic Preservation — the extensions, the April 2020 letter, the unanimous termination vote and the pulled $62 million, and the October 2020 agreement.