Plans for office building at prominent Live Oak lot scrapped

LIVE OAK - A plan to build a new office building at a prominent lot here has been scrapped, meaning the site will likely continue to serve as the seasonal home for sales of pumpkins and Christmas trees for the foreseeable future.

The proposal, calling for the construction of a 12,000-square-foot building at the corner of 17th Avenue and Brommer Street, gained traction in recent months, with Barry Swenson hoping to submit plans to the county in January.

But that momentum has ground to a halt, and "we have made a determination that we will not be moving forward with this development," according to Barry Swenson's Libby Glass, who was heading the project.

That decision was made soon after a Jan. 12 meeting at the Simpkins Family Swim Center, where area residents were invited to come and view a new architectural design and provide feedback on the overall plans. Everyone appeared happy with the new design, but still, they said, that area is zoned for retail stores that benefit the entire community, and that's not what Barry Swenson had in mind.

Of the tenants that had expressed interest in the building, two are now located at the Live Oak Business Park. They have to move anyway to make way for the new Mid-County Sheriff's headquarters, and they appeared to be on the verge of signing pre-lease agreements. That, Glass said last month, would make it easier to obtain financing.

"The building that we had designed, in terms of dimensions and function, was really more suitable for the types of (research and development) and office tenants we had intended to relocate from Live Oak Business Park," she acknowledged in an email Thursday.

The project was only viable with those tenants as well as retail, but "once it became clear that there would be restrictions placed upon the more office types of uses in the future, we had serious concerns regarding the long term financial feasibility of the project."

But Supervisor John Leopold, whose district includes Live Oak, said he thought it was more a matter of Barry Swenson not realizing the community's particular attachment to that lot. In 2000, the Live Oak Neighbors community group formed specifically to fight a plan to build a Wendy's Restaurant there.

"That corner has a history and it was easy to identify that these issues would come up, but (Barry Swenson) went forward with the process because they could get financing for it," he said.

Follow Sentinel reporter Kimberly White on Twitter @kwhite95066.

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Plans for office building at prominent Live Oak lot scrapped