City Council Tables Resolution To Lease Alternative Site for Municipal Garage

City Council tabled a resolution during a special council meeting on Tuesday night, allowing Mayor Dawn Zimmer the authority to negotiate one lease agreement with a Jersey City landlord. In order to grant the administration the ability to negotiate with more than just one party and look into the different options for a location for the new—and, at least for now, temporary—municipal garage, the matter will be discussed in a future meeting. 

The Administration recommended its top two out of seven Requests for Proposal received last week. One Hoboken option and one Jersey City option were presented. Then, during the meeting, a third option appeared when Ronnie Miller, owner of Mile Square Towing, said he'd lease part of his property on 16th and Jefferson Streets to the city for roughly $28,000 a year, plus the cost of utilities. Miller did not submit an RFP and currently has a towing contract with the city.

The city will have to vacate the municipal garage on Observer Highway before August 13, which is the closing date with developer S. Hekemian Group, who has agreed to buy the property for $25.5 million. Before that date, the city needs to acquire a "no further action" letter from the Department of Environmental Protection. 

Council approved a resolution (after approving the transfer of line items in the budget to finance it) to award a $60,000 contract to Weston Solutions Inc. to complete the remediation of the Observer Highway site.

Although the council seemed to agree that the location in Jersey City—located on 173 16th St.—is the best option for Hoboken, Business Administrator Arch Liston said that Jersey City Mayor Jerramaiah Healy is vehemently opposed to the plan. The facility on 16th Street, falls into a redevelopment area, that Jersey City wants to upgrade from industrial, to commercial-residential, Liston explained.  

If the deal in Jersey City would fall through, said Third Ward Councilman Michael Russo, "we're right back to where we are." Russo added that the mayor and the Business Administrator should be given the right to negotiate more options than just the Jersey City location, as was originally written in the resolution on the agenda.

The Hoboken site would use part of a Stevens' garage on 600 Sinatra Dr. as the indoor facility and the block on Clinton Street between 15th and 16th Streets (which would be closed to cars) for outdoor parking of vehicles. Director of Environmental Services Jennifer Wenson Maier said this is among the cheapest options. According to a document that was distributed during the meeting, outfitting the Clinton St. location will cost roughly $200,000. 

Second Ward Councilwoman Beth Mason said it wasn't clear to her why the other options were being eliminated. 

About the Stevens' campus building, which is located on the Hoboken waterfront, Maier said: "nobody would notice anything different from what it is now."

Although Fourth Ward Councilman Michael Lenz said that the mayor should keep talking to the Jersey City landowner, Liston said that Healy was adament about the issue. 

"If we move forward i think we're going to have substantial issues with Jersey City," Liston said. "They could make it uncomfortable for us."

First Ward Councilwoman Theresa Castellano said that if the situation were reverse, she probably wouldn't want a Jersey City facility moving into Hoboken either. 

Although the city has to move out of the current garage to hold up its end of the agreement with Hekemian, it's still unclear what will happen on Aug. 13. Fourth Ward Councilman Michael Lenz said he thinks it unlikely that Hekemian is going to be able to pay $25.5 on Aug. 13. 

The city's development attorney, Gordon Litman, attended the meeting and said that Doug Cohen, Hekemian's corporate counsel, told him Hekemian is ready to close. If Hekemian fails to close, Hoboken gets the $2.55 million deposit Hekemian has already paid. In the case the city is not going to be able to close on Aug. 13, it will lose that deposit.

Maier said it will take the city a couple of weeks to move all of its vehicles and equipment from the garage.