St. Petersburg to sell part of former Moffitt Cancer Center land

ST. PETERSBURG — The block and a half of downtown, city-owned land once envisioned as a Moffitt Cancer Center campus has sat dormant for two years since Mayor Ken Welch spiked it for not including what he considered enough affordable housing. With a 6-2 vote from City Council Thursday, St. Petersburg city officials will sell a third of the property, the southeast corner of Second Avenue South and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Street, to its next-door neighbor, developer Third Lake Partners. The land is on the east doorstep of the planned Historic Gas Plant District, the future home of a $1. 3 billion stadium for the Tampa Bay Rays, and would keep Second Ave South as a main thoroughfare. “This would act as game day street into the Gas Plant project,” said Aaron Fisch, the city’s real estate and property management director, at the council meeting. But the deal reopened old wounds from the scuttled Moffitt deal.

As one public speaker, Jason Spitzer, argued, Welch’s decision created a “Moffitt standard” for nixing projects that hasn’t been applied to any other project since. “There’s been no clear explanation from this administration as to why that deal was so terrible and this deal is so great” despite having no affordable or workforce housing, said Spitzer, who described himself as pro-development. According to city development administrator James Corbett, Third Lake Partners is planning to build a mixed-use project that could include condos, offices, shops and hotel space on the Second Avenue South block. Some of the proceeds from the sale would help pay for an affordable and workforce townhome project in the Deuces commercial district that has cost the city far more than planned. The negotiated price of $10 million for part of the former Moffitt land also is below the value determined by two appraisals, one placing its worth at $15 million, the other at $16.

4 million. But city officials say offloading this parcel would save taxpayers more money in the long run. Corbett said this deal would sever the city from a cumbersome lease inked in 1987. Back then, the city wanted to stop a business called Peninsula Motor Club from moving from its headquarters at 800 Second Ave S. Peninsula owned the east half of that block.

In 1981, the city acquired the west half, which is the 1. 5 acres of land for sale now. Peninsula said it needed more parking. So the city crafted a 99-year lease that had Peninsula paying nominal rent for 90 surface parking spaces to a developer the city was working with at the time. The city of St.

Petersburg's illustration of the two blocks of downtown land owned by the city, Third Lake Partners and the subject property that will be sold for $10 million.