In a business-as-usual meeting sandwiched between evaluations of the city’s in-progress Comprehensive Plan, City Council voted 5-2 to reauthorize a contract harmonious with the Putting Assets to Work Plan, focusing on rehabilitating three under-utilized city-owned properties with a federal grant.
With confusion surrounding the city’s multiple ongoing plans and projects, including the Comprehensive Plan and strategic housing plan, Evanston’s economic development manager, Paul Zalmezak, clarified that “Putting Assets to Work” was not an urban plan, but an ongoing, federally-backed initiative.
“It’s a community engagement process that will help drive the City Council to an answer to how we’re going to use our assets in a more efficient and, potentially, revenue-generating way,” Zalmezak said.
According to a memo from Zalmezak, the grant’s end-product is to create specific development plans for the former Lorraine H. Morton Civic Center at 2100 Ridge Ave., the Noyes Cultural Arts Center and the Evanston Police/Fire Headquarters to take to market.
All contract targets were selected for their priorities in the city and their proximity to transit stations for transit-oriented development.
The “Putting Assets to Work” contract with Utah-based consultant Propvizer, which was first approved by the previous council in February 2025, was put on hold due to the accidental exclusion of another consultant, Urban Resolve, in the request for proposals phase. Upon reevaluation, city staff recommended to reauthorize the Propvizer contract, which has not initiated work since it was put on hold.
The entirety of the process will be covered by a $985,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation awarded to the city in September 2024. The Biden-era Innovative Finance and Asset Concession Grant, is a transit-oriented development grant that Zalmezak said faces no current threats of federal cuts.
Ald. Clare Kelly (1st), who voted against contract reauthorization alongside Ald. Parielle Davis (7th), advocated to hold it until council discussed its alignment with the city’s in-progress Comprehensive plan and incoming strategic housing plan, arguing that a new contract would take more time away from city staff.
“We should not be adding this (contract) to it,” Kelly said. “If we need this, it will come out of our comprehensive plan and strategic housing plan.”
However, Zalmezak reminded council that the city is already under contract and has lost approximately eight weeks of the three-year grant deadline due to its reevaluation of the contract.
Ald. Bobby Burns (5th) countered Kelly, maintaining that hiring a consultant would “pick up” where the city has left off on “Putting Assets to Work” efforts and conversations and further streamline city staff’s efforts toward the initiative.
Burns contended that plans for these specific three Evanston properties can harmonize alongside city-wide plans to strategize its use of other city-owned properties through the comprehensive and strategic housing plans.
“This is going to make it so we can move a little quicker,” Burns said. “It’s going to allow us to add more structure to it by having a professional consultant to help work with us on this.”
While Kelly had initial reservations of the contract’s authorization under the previous council without input from newly-elected council members, first-term Ald. Matt Rodgers (8th) posed observations to prioritize development plans for the Police/Fire Headquarters, calling it an “immediate need.”
The grant, which will resume work and gather community engagement and updates throughout the process, is set to expire by January 31, 2028, according to Zalmezak.
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