[Johnny Ryall]

Pinch, Pyramid to get $70M in fed money to prepare for Bass Pro Shops
The Commercial | By Tom Bailey Jr.

The city of Memphis plans to spend all its federal recovery act bonds -- $70 million -- to redevelop The Pyramid and the Pinch District. The money will be used to prepare the arena for Bass Pro Shops, strengthen it against earthquakes and bring new sidewalks, lighting, signs, drainage and other infrastructure to the adjacent Pinch District, Robert Lipscomb, the city's director of Housing and Community Development, said Monday. The spending also continues the city's strategy to protect the thousands of high-quality jobs at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, a few blocks east of The Pyramid. If Uptown had not been improved, Lipscomb said, St. Jude would not have made its "$3 billion expansion." The city and developers have already transformed rundown housing projects flanking St. Jude to the north and south. "Now it's going to the west," Lipscomb said of the neighborhood improvements.

The federal economic recovery act provides about $70 million in subsidized financing for private and public construction projects to Memphis. "The (Pyramid/Pinch) project is an important one for the administration and the city of Memphis," city Finance Director Roland McElrath said Monday. Completion of a lease agreement is "imminent" with Bass Pro Shops, which would redevelop The Pyramid arena into a mix of retail, entertainment and offices, he said. Once Bass Pro Shops commits to remake The Pyramid, Poag & McEwen Lifestyle Centers would launch a related project to redevelop a swath of the Pinch District extending east from The Pyramid toward St. Jude. Complementing Bass Pro Shops' adaptation of The Pyramid, the Pinch District project also would be a mix of retail, restaurants and entertainment.

The federal Recovery Zone program provides two types of bonds. One is economic development bonds, to be used by governments only. The bonds would allow Memphis to pay 45 percent less in interest costs than with normal bonds. The city was allocated $27.7 million in these bonds. The other is facility bonds, to be issued by local government but used by private businesses. They are tax exempt, making the interest rate 2 to 3 percentage points lower, or saving 30 to 35 percent in interest costs. Memphis was allocated $41.6 million in these bonds.

Memphis would have financed the Bass Pro Shops and Pinch District redevelopment with or without the cheaper money, McElrath indicated. "It simply would have been a little more expensive if we didn't have the Recovery Zone bonds available," he said. The Memphis and Shelby County Industrial Development Board and Center City Revenue Finance Corp. are authorized to issue Recovery Zone bonds. On Wednesday, the industrial board will be asked to support the city's request.