Jazz collective seeking Georgia Cities loan to renovate Greene’s building
Cornerstone Jazz Collective is under contract to purchase the property at 141 E. Trinity Place in downtown Decatur. The business is planning to apply for a loan through the Georgia Cities Foundation to fund part of its rehabilitation and renovation project.
Greene’s Fine Foods currently occupies the building and has sold candy, toys and other treats to Decatur residents and visitors for about 16 years. Greene’s is still open for business and has not announced a closing date.
The owners of Greene’s — Phil and Tommy Greene — previously confirmed that a potential sale is pending and said their plan is to relocate the current store to another yet-to-be-determined location.
The Decatur Downtown Development Authority supported the loan application during its meeting on Aug. 9. The Georgia Cities Foundation loan typically gives a maximum loan amount of $200,000 per project. It’s unknown what the loan amount will be for the jazz collective.
“One thing I do want to point out is that development authorities are the conduit for these types of loans,” Assistant City Manager Angela Threadgill said.
The DDA has no financial responsibility related to the loan. The loan would be given to the DDA, and then the DDA would give the loan to Cornerstone. The Georgia Cities Foundation requires DDA’s to qualify projects that contribute to a downtown and master plan.
“They don’t want to give money to provide projects in downtown that aren’t compliant with what you do,” DDA Attorney Kyle Williams said. “The money comes from them, the lender itself is the cities foundation, however, [the DDA] is the one that’s the middle person there.”
Cornerstone Jazz Collective would receive the loan once they have acquired the property.
Cornerstone Jazz Collective anticipates closing on the property on Aug. 30. The asking price for the sale is $4 million, and the owners have estimated the renovation cost to be $2 million. Decaturish previously reported that the renovations would take about 12 months to complete. Cornerstone owners hope to begin the renovations this fall.
The jazz collective will include Phoenix City Jazz Club, a restaurant, a place for music lessons and retail sales of musical instruments, according to Eileen Fishman, a business consultant and investor on the project. Musician Will Scruggs is the founder and manager of the collective.
The building will also feature a coffee shop and café, Scruggs told the DDA on Aug. 9.
Scruggs, a local musician, used to manage music for Ray’s in the City restaurants and knows many people in the local music scene. A question that often comes up is: where’s the jazz club in Atlanta?
Scruggs hopes to answer that question with Cornerstone Jazz Collective.
“Metro Atlanta has a lot of great jazz talent, but we don’t have a space where the artists can really thrive and where the community can access that great talent,” Scruggs told the DDA on Aug. 9. “I have a vision to create an oasis called the Cornerstone Jazz Collective, and hopefully the headquarters will be right here in downtown Decatur.”
The property is about half an acre and over 9,000 square feet. There are 23 spaces in the parking lot. It features a new commercial kitchen, grease trap, a walk-in fridge and 16 beer taps.
“They’re really taken great care of the building, and we feel like it’s an ideal placed for this vision to thrive,” Scruggs said. “What our plans are, they include redesigning the patio and a new entrance on the side of the building. We can preserve the front to how it was historically.”
The owners plan to replace a couple of windows with a door to allow for access through the patio area.
The main level would be the music space and restaurant dining space. The second floor will have a green room for the musicians and a recording studio. The basement is slated to house the music store and private lesson rooms.
“We’re going to build an elevator so we can open up the basement for the music store,” Scruggs said. “That’s the big change that we’re making on the property, but that’s the only real change is adding an elevator and a dish room on the back corner of the property.”
The building would additionally have banquet space for private rentals. Scruggs hopes that Cornerstone Jazz Collective will also serve as more event space in downtown Decatur. Better Together Solar is a corporate sponsor of the project. They will add solar panels to the roof and electric vehicle charging stations in the parking lot.
Scruggs added that the goal is to create a collaborative ecosystem in which the tenants work together to drive traffic to the property.
“We’re going to do low-based rent and revenue sharing leases to help our tenants get started and hopefully create a little jazz engine right here in downtown Decatur,” he said. “We want to create access to the arts. We want to develop the next generation of jazz talent, and hopefully, we can set a model with our new model for a community-owned social enterprise.”
The plan is for Scruggs to own and operate the building and run the music venue. There will be lease for the restaurant and music store tenants. Scruggs and Fishman have a letter of intent from Atlanta ProWinds, who will operate the music store and facilitate the music lessons.
Tandem Bank in Tucker is financing the project with a 50/50 debt-to-equity ratio. The bank will help Scruggs and Fishman get into the building and with the construction budget.
This story was provided by WABE content partner Decaturish.
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