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CRAIN’S CLEVELAND BUSINESS
WWW.CRAINSCLEVELAND.COM
FEBRUARY 25 - MARCH 3 , 2013
LEASED
PARMA COMMERCE CENTER 5575 VENTURE DR, PARMA, OHIO
Newmark Grubb Knight Frank is pleased to announce a 35,350 SF lease extension with Beltmann Group Incorporated. Special thanks to Joe Messina of Jones Lang Lasalle for representing the tenant in this transaction.
STAN BULLARD
The NASA Glenn north campus in Fairview Park was sold for $1.2 million in an auction. Full Selection of Commercial & Investment Offerings Available at
TerryCoyne.com Or Call Terry at
216.453.3001 1350 Euclid Ave, Ste. 300 Cleveland, Ohio 44115
RestoreCleveland plans to do just that to NASA Glenn north Property in Fairview Park was purchased for $1.2M in auction By STAN BULLARD sbullard@crain.com
With a winning bid of $1.2 million in an auction run by the General Services Administration, an affiliate of the RestoreCleveland Co. real estate development firm stands to become the next owner of the two-building NASA Glenn north campus in Fairview Park. William Gallagher, a spokesman for Cleveland-based RestoreCleveland, said GSA has notified his group it won the auction, besting three other bidders. The principals of RestoreCleveland and an investor group soon will form a limited liability corporation to hold ownership of the property, Mr. Gallagher said. Cat Langel, a Chicago-based GSA public affairs officer, confirmed by email that Mr. Gallagher’s group is the high bidder for the NASA Glenn property. GSA expects to close the sale within 90 days. True to its name, RestoreCleve-
land wants to renovate the buildings to attract new tenants. The group hopes to draw aerospacerelated businesses, general office tenants or corporate headquarters to the site at 21000 Brookpark Road. “We will do whatever we can to get the property occupied and thriving for everyone,” Mr. Gallagher said in a news release. In an interview with Crain’s, Mr. Gallagher said principals of RestoreCleveland had joined with a group of local investors he declined to identify to buy the redevelopment site. RestoreCleveland previously has restored old buildings in Cleveland’s St. Clair-Superior neighborhood near downtown. Fairview Park Mayor Eileen Patton said in a news release that the suburb believes the project is “extremely important for the wellbeing of Fairview Park and its residents.” The suburb lost about $400,000 yearly in income tax receipts when NASA Glenn consolidated its operations outside the Fairview Park site to the south side of Brookpark Road, which is in Brook Park. The two buildings NASA wants to shed include a total of 200,000 square feet of offices on nine acres.
They date from the 1960s. One of the buildings is K-shaped, Mayor Patton said, reflecting the idea that John Kennedy was president when they were constructed. The properties include an auditorium, cafeteria and other amenities that will be helpful in restoring the complex to use. Mayor Patton said investor groups from California and Texas had quizzed the city about the property. However, she said she is encouraged because a local group was the high bidder. “We think they will act more quickly,” she said. GSA’s online auction of the federal property began last August with a minimum bid of $200,000. Mr. Gallagher said his investor group believed it could not pay “much more” than its final bid for the site. He estimates it will take about $3 million to ready the site for commercial tenants, even though the structures are well-built and in generally good condition. Mr. Gallagher declined to identify the private investor group that will join RestoreCleveland in the project. RestoreCleveland’s other principals include Mr. Gallagher’s brother, Martin Gallagher, and partner John Elias. ■
New Polyflow unit close to completion By FRANK ESPOSITO Plastics News
Recycling technology company RES Polyflow of Akron will have its first full scale plastic-to-chemicals unit up and running by the end of March. The unit represents an investment of $5 million to $6 million for Polyflow. It will be located in Perry, in Lake County, near the facilities of Niagara Systems, the company that’s designing and building the unit along with Chemstress Consultant Co. of Akron. Once the unit is fully operational, Polyflow officials will need to decide whether to build a plant around the unit or transfer it to a location chosen from several interested customers, CEO Jay Schabel said in a Feb. 7 phone interview. “We have to decide where (the unit) will be most profitable,” he said. Polyflow’s pyrolysis technology
melts down any type of plastic scrap at nearly 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit. The vapor then is condensed into a liquid slurry that contains aromatic chemicals. The liquid can be reused by petrochemical companies or in paint, coatings and solvents. Polyflow currently is using plastic scrap from numerous sources, including compounding leader PolyOne Corp., Hiram College, the city of Stow and a local military base. The company has collected about 65,000 pounds of plastic scrap in the last three months. Company officials previously said a full-size reactor unit will be able to process 5,000 pounds of mixed plastic scrap per hour and would produce 3 million gallons of chemical liquids per year. Four full-time employees are working on the Polyflow unit. If a plant measuring 20,000 to 25,000 square feet is built, Polyflow would
need to hire 30 more employees, Mr. Schabel said. Plant construction would add $5 million to $6 million to the cost of the project, according to Mr. Schabel. Polyflow won a $1.6 million state grant in 2011 and received a similar-size investment last year from private equity firm Ambassador Enterprises LLC of Fort Wayne, Ind. Mr. Schabel said Ambassador now owns a minority stake in Polyflow. He declined to identify other investors. Another state grant of $600,000 will fund the construction of a fuelanalysis lab that will be used by faculty and students from Youngstown State University. That lab will test the liquids produced by the Polyflow unit and will be located on the Youngstown State campus. ■ Frank Esposito is a senior reporter with Plastics News, a sister publication of Crain’s Cleveland Business.
Volume 34, Number 8 Crain’s Cleveland Business (ISSN 0197-2375) is published weekly, except for combined issues on the fourth week of December and fifth week of December at 700 West St. Clair Ave., Suite 310, Cleveland, OH 44113-1230. Copyright © 2013 by Crain Communications Inc. Periodicals postage paid at Cleveland, Ohio, and at additional mailing offices. Price per copy: $2.00. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Crain’s Cleveland Business, Circulation Department, 1155 Gratiot Avenue, Detroit, Michigan 48207-2912. 1-877-824-9373. REPRINT INFORMATION: 800-290-5460 Ext. 136