Marquette Tower is almost out of time to avoid foreclosure

With a foreclosure sale scheduled for 1 p.m. Tuesday, time is running out for Prost Builders of Jefferson City to keep control of the Marquette Tower and Marquette Center in downtown Cape Girardeau.

The tower and center were renovated with taxpayer help in the form of state and federal historic preservation and environmental remediation tax credits. The tower is the home to several state offices, including the Children's Division of the Missouri Department of Social Services and the state Division of Workforce Development. The Marquette Centre is unoccupied.

With the foreclosure looming, state officials from the commissioner of administration Larry Schepker to Lt. Gov. Peter Kinder and state Sen. Jason Crowell are involved in multisided negotiations that could bring the building into state ownership.

"We are reviewing all possible scenarios involving this property, and we will work to find the best deal for the state and the people of Cape Girardeau," Schepker said in an interview last week. "We are negotiating with several different parties."

The foreclosure sale is being forced by Great Southern Bank of Springfield, Mo., holder of the construction note, based on "default in payment of debt and performance of obligations," according to a legal notice that has been published in the Southeast Missourian every Wednesday since Feb. 27. Vaughn Prost, president of Prost Builders, did not return a message seeking comment but has said previously that the inability to find a tenant for the Marquette Centre and the failure to fill the Marquette Tower were squeezing his cash flow. Prost operates the building under a business called Marquette Office Building LLC.

The Marquette has 66,117 square feet of space, of which 30,844 square feet is leased to state agencies under a contract that expires in 2014. Additional space is used by contract agencies but about 20 percent of the building is empty. There is 11,662 square feet, all unused, in the Marquette Centre.

The Marquette Tower is one of four locations in Cape Girardeau where state agencies lease office space for various programs. The Department of Health and Senior Services and the Department of Social Services lease 19,325 square feet at 710 Southern Expressway under a contract that was recently extended through Dec. 31. The Department of Public Safety, the Department of Revenue, the Department of Labor and Industrial Relations and the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education lease 32,800 square feet on Blattner Drive under a contract that expires June 30. And the Attorney General's office leases 2,500 square feet at 2860 Kage Road under a lease that expires June 30, 2009.

There are other locations operated by state government in Cape Girardeau, but those include facilities such as the state crime lab and a Division of Youth Services day treatment center.

"I'd like to see consolidation," Lt. Gov. Peter Kinder said Thursday. "There has apparently been some resistance to that in the Office of Adminstration."

Whether the state takes ownership or remains in a long-term lease arrangement is yet to be determined, Kinder said.

State Sen. Jason Crowell, in a message left with the Southeast Missourian, did not indicate whether he preferred for the state to take over ownership or remain as a tenant. He said he is monitoring the situation.

"Where we are right now is that all options are on the table...we are exploring everything and running numbers and working with the community and all the stakeholders," Crowell said.

Even with the looming foreclosure, the steps that will be taken by the state aren't ready, Crowell said. "We have been working on this quite some time but not ready to announce anything," he said.

To determine how to proceed, Schepker said the state is looking at what Prost owes on the building, the value of the building and what it would take for the state to obtain ownership.

The current state budget doesn't include any specific approriation for purchasing the two buildings, nor does the budget for the coming year that is under consideration by the Missouri Legislature. That shouldn't be an obstacle to making a purchase if a decision is made to pursue ownership, Schepker said.

"We are currently looking at an opportunity that would not require a change in appropriations," he said.

Prost put the buildings on the market in October, asking $4.5 million for the Marquette Tower and $1.4 million for the Marquette Centre. He purchased the tower in 2002 for a reported $350,000 as it faced city demolition orders after sitting empty for more than 20 years. The renovations cost a reported $6 million.

While only 20 percent of the Marquette Tower is currently empty, an additional 3,700 square feet will be opened by the decision, announced last week, that the Workforce Investment Board is moving out of the building.

Last week, real estate broker Tom Kelsey of Lorimont Place Ltd. announced he had completed a deal for the board, which subleases space from the Division of Workforce Development, to return to offices in the Eagle Peak Building at 760 S. Kingshighway.

The Workforce Investment Board had sought to move last fall to the old Du-Shell's Furniture building on William Street. That move would have also taken the Division of Workforce Development and a board subcontractor, MERS/Goodwill, to the new location as well.

That step was blocked by the state because it did not want to pay for space for an agency and its contractors that would not be used. But June O'Dell, chief executive officer of the board, said space issues overcame the state's objections. MERS/Goodwill will remain at Marquette Tower, she said.

"It is simply I have too many people in this office and we have three U-Haul buildings," she said. "This will allow us to bring our files on-site and get rid of those U-Hauls."

rkeller@semissourian.com

335-6611 extension 126

Does this affect you?

Have a comment?

Log on to semissourian.com/today