Rebecca Arnold, left, an executive with ScanlanKemperBard, the firm that owns York Street Yards, stands with Fred Glick, who is seeking to develop affordable housing next door. (Matt Geiger/BusinessDen)
The Denver City Council will vote Monday evening on a rezoning request in Clayton that a pair of developers say would allow the development of income-restricted apartments and bring a large mixed-use industrial property into the modern zoning code.
But first, they must overcome the concerns from some council members.
“I guess it doesn’t make sense to me, and I’m not in the business of presenting blank checks to developers for the future of an area that has seen rampant gentrification and displacement in my lifetime,” Councilwoman Amanda Sandoval said in an August meeting on the matter.
The rezoning is for 31 acres. It includes the entire York Street Yards development at 39th Avenue and York Street, and two rows of former U.S. Army warehouses that now host a mix of retail and industrial. It also includes a portion of green space next to it, whose owner calls it the “Quad.”
York Street Yards is owned by ScanlanKemperBard, a Portland-based firm that bought it in 2020 for $77 million. SKB President Todd M. Gooding told BusinessDen his firm has invested a total of $160 million into the property.
The Quad, part of the 3840 York St. parcel, is owned by local developer Fred Glick.
The proposal calls for both sites to be rezoned I-MX-5, an industrial mixed-use zone allowing for up to five stories.
A 2018 photo of the property now known as York Street Yards. (BusinessDen file)
In multiple committee meetings on the matter, some members of council expressed frustration that the rezoning of York Street Yards wouldn’t come with any community benefit agreements or special conditions that would allow for more certainty about the future of the site.
Gooding, however, said that, with some leases locked in for decades, there’s no reason for anything onsite at York Street Yards to change dramatically in the coming years.
“These council members who say we’re going to go off and build multifamily housing all over the place are ludicrous,” he said. “Our biggest problem is parking under the old zoning code. All we want is the I-MX zoning to give us more flexibility to enhance the property.”
The old zoning code comes with wonky parking requirements involving approvals from city entities that no longer exist, according to the rezoning application, complicating tenant build outs and SKB’s plans to bring more retail to York Street Yards.
“It would be a real travesty that the city can’t extend some level of trust about what we’re doing and how we’re doing it,” Gooding said.
Contacted for comment, Councilwoman Sandoval said she couldn’t talk until after the vote.
Fred Glick, who lives next door to 3840 York St, said the matter is emblematic of how Clayton has been ignored by the city, especially considering the 76 letters of support for the rezoning, with one of those from the Clayton neighborhood organization.
“I have yet to have a conversation with somebody who lives in the vicinity who’s opposed to this,” Glick said.
Glick is involved because he wants to build an income-restricted apartment building with Philadelphia-based developer Pennrose.
He originally sought to build it on the site he calls the Quad. But SKB opposed that plan, citing parking and circulation concerns.
Both sites participated in city-recommended mediation. And they came up with a compromise, in the form of a land-swap deal.
If the rezoning passes, Glick will hand ownership of the roughly half-acre Quad to SKB. And SKB will give him and Pennrose ownership of a nearly 2-acre site on the other side of York Street Yards, at 3897 Steele St.
A map of York Street Yards and adjacent properties that highlights the two parcels that are part of the planned land-swap deal. (City documents)
The project is expected to be a four-story, 75-unit building serving seniors aged 55 and older making between 30 percent and 80 percent of the area’s median income. There would be 5,000 square feet of space reserved for West of 50, an offshoot of the nonprofit Center on Colfax, which provides services for LGBTQ Denverites.
Glick and Pennrose envision this development as “LGBTQ affirming.”
“A lot of my early mentors and people I really looked up to were LGBTQ, and I lost a lot of them to AIDS. We lost a lot of people. I’m getting to an age now where I think about the people who were lost, and they would be of an age where this project would be a potential home for them. … So for me, this is, I guess, a way of giving back to some people who gave me so much, even if they’re not here,” said Glick, 56.
Gooding said York Street Yards’ half-million square feet are teeming with a wide array of tenants, from fitness studios to asteroid mining to electric car manufacturer Rivian. The project is 73 percent leased, on track to hit 90 percent by next spring, Gooding said.
He estimates that the project has created over 100 new jobs in Denver.
“We’re being given zero credit for that,” Gooding said. “We’re evil developers because we want the zoning everyone else wants.”
A picture of the roughly half-acre “Quad” where Glick initially planned for his housing development to go. (Matt Geiger/BusinessDen)
Speaking last week, both Gooding and Glick said they aren’t certain if the rezoning will be approved.
“We’ll be in front of council on the 14th of October, and that’s the ‘do or die’ moment. Either the project happens or it doesn’t at that stage,” Glick said.
If denied, Glick — who serves on Denver’s Planning Board, the first city body that reviews rezoning applications — said he must wait another two years to reapply, at which point he expects his housing project to be “dead in the water.”
Glick noted that Denver is in the early stages of an effort to update all obsolete zoning citywide, like the one at York Street Yards. So, if the land isn’t rezoned now, it will likely be at some point.
“If this fails, at some point the city is going to be reinvesting staff resources in zoning this property into the current zoning code,” Glick said.
Rebecca Arnold, left, an executive with ScanlanKemperBard, the firm that owns York Street Yards, stands with Fred Glick, who is seeking to develop affordable housing next door. (Matt Geiger/BusinessDen)
The Denver City Council will vote Monday evening on a rezoning request in Clayton that a pair of developers say would allow the development of income-restricted apartments and bring a large mixed-use industrial property into the modern zoning code.
But first, they must overcome the concerns from some council members.
“I guess it doesn’t make sense to me, and I’m not in the business of presenting blank checks to developers for the future of an area that has seen rampant gentrification and displacement in my lifetime,” Councilwoman Amanda Sandoval said in an August meeting on the matter.
The rezoning is for 31 acres. It includes the entire York Street Yards development at 39th Avenue and York Street, and two rows of former U.S. Army warehouses that now host a mix of retail and industrial. It also includes a portion of green space next to it, whose owner calls it the “Quad.”
York Street Yards is owned by ScanlanKemperBard, a Portland-based firm that bought it in 2020 for $77 million. SKB President Todd M. Gooding told BusinessDen his firm has invested a total of $160 million into the property.
The Quad, part of the 3840 York St. parcel, is owned by local developer Fred Glick.
The proposal calls for both sites to be rezoned I-MX-5, an industrial mixed-use zone allowing for up to five stories.
A 2018 photo of the property now known as York Street Yards. (BusinessDen file)
In multiple committee meetings on the matter, some members of council expressed frustration that the rezoning of York Street Yards wouldn’t come with any community benefit agreements or special conditions that would allow for more certainty about the future of the site.
Gooding, however, said that, with some leases locked in for decades, there’s no reason for anything onsite at York Street Yards to change dramatically in the coming years.
“These council members who say we’re going to go off and build multifamily housing all over the place are ludicrous,” he said. “Our biggest problem is parking under the old zoning code. All we want is the I-MX zoning to give us more flexibility to enhance the property.”
The old zoning code comes with wonky parking requirements involving approvals from city entities that no longer exist, according to the rezoning application, complicating tenant build outs and SKB’s plans to bring more retail to York Street Yards.
“It would be a real travesty that the city can’t extend some level of trust about what we’re doing and how we’re doing it,” Gooding said.
Contacted for comment, Councilwoman Sandoval said she couldn’t talk until after the vote.
Fred Glick, who lives next door to 3840 York St, said the matter is emblematic of how Clayton has been ignored by the city, especially considering the 76 letters of support for the rezoning, with one of those from the Clayton neighborhood organization.
“I have yet to have a conversation with somebody who lives in the vicinity who’s opposed to this,” Glick said.
Glick is involved because he wants to build an income-restricted apartment building with Philadelphia-based developer Pennrose.
He originally sought to build it on the site he calls the Quad. But SKB opposed that plan, citing parking and circulation concerns.
Both sites participated in city-recommended mediation. And they came up with a compromise, in the form of a land-swap deal.
If the rezoning passes, Glick will hand ownership of the roughly half-acre Quad to SKB. And SKB will give him and Pennrose ownership of a nearly 2-acre site on the other side of York Street Yards, at 3897 Steele St.
A map of York Street Yards and adjacent properties that highlights the two parcels that are part of the planned land-swap deal. (City documents)
The project is expected to be a four-story, 75-unit building serving seniors aged 55 and older making between 30 percent and 80 percent of the area’s median income. There would be 5,000 square feet of space reserved for West of 50, an offshoot of the nonprofit Center on Colfax, which provides services for LGBTQ Denverites.
Glick and Pennrose envision this development as “LGBTQ affirming.”
“A lot of my early mentors and people I really looked up to were LGBTQ, and I lost a lot of them to AIDS. We lost a lot of people. I’m getting to an age now where I think about the people who were lost, and they would be of an age where this project would be a potential home for them. … So for me, this is, I guess, a way of giving back to some people who gave me so much, even if they’re not here,” said Glick, 56.
Gooding said York Street Yards’ half-million square feet are teeming with a wide array of tenants, from fitness studios to asteroid mining to electric car manufacturer Rivian. The project is 73 percent leased, on track to hit 90 percent by next spring, Gooding said.
He estimates that the project has created over 100 new jobs in Denver.
“We’re being given zero credit for that,” Gooding said. “We’re evil developers because we want the zoning everyone else wants.”
A picture of the roughly half-acre “Quad” where Glick initially planned for his housing development to go. (Matt Geiger/BusinessDen)
Speaking last week, both Gooding and Glick said they aren’t certain if the rezoning will be approved.
“We’ll be in front of council on the 14th of October, and that’s the ‘do or die’ moment. Either the project happens or it doesn’t at that stage,” Glick said.
If denied, Glick — who serves on Denver’s Planning Board, the first city body that reviews rezoning applications — said he must wait another two years to reapply, at which point he expects his housing project to be “dead in the water.”
Glick noted that Denver is in the early stages of an effort to update all obsolete zoning citywide, like the one at York Street Yards. So, if the land isn’t rezoned now, it will likely be at some point.
“If this fails, at some point the city is going to be reinvesting staff resources in zoning this property into the current zoning code,” Glick said.
