To Grove or not to Grove

The city-owned lot next to Patriot Park has sat vacant for years. West Homewood residents Sonya DiCarlo and Paula Harris were among the earliest to recognize its potential and have been working with the city of Homewood since late 2014 on a Cajun cafe, retail and event space concept called The Grove.

Their presentations to the city, however, stirred interest from other possible developers. After hearing multiple ideas from residents, the City Council decided to halt their negotiations with DiCarlo and Harris and send out a request for proposals (RFP) to get formal development proposals.

“The feeling was that it’d be best for the city to put out an RFP and capture everybody that’s interested,” Ward 2 Representative Vance Moody said. “We may get something that we never even thought of.”

The RFP was approved by the City Council July 13 and went into effect July 15. City attorney Mike Kendrick said interested parties will have until Aug. 31 to submit proposals for the lot. 

“This is a good way to gauge how serious the interest is,” Moody said. “We’d like a nice development that will fit with and serve the community. Beyond that I don’t have anything preconceived.”

Fellow Ward 2 Representative Fred Hawkins said he has heard from four individuals so far with ideas for the property. Their ideas included restaurants, a brewery, an event space, a sports bar, or mixed-use developments that would include first-story retail and second-story condos overlooking the park. Hawkins said he favors a restaurant-retail development.

Ward 1 Representative Britt Thames has heard from multiple groups offering mixed residential and commercial buildings. One proposal included office space, and another had a courtyard design that could become a small event area. Thames said he thinks any mixed-use property would be an “easy sell” for the area.

David Shaw, who co-owns Magic City Sweet Ice with his wife Wani, said he was a fan of Cajun food and had been excited about DiCarlo and Harris’s proposal, which they named The Grove. However, he also supported the idea of a retail area for local business or rentable office space for West Homewood residents who own small businesses.

“Anything family-friendly going up there would be a positive, to say the least,” he said.

Jordan Acton, who works at Magic City Sweet Ice and is a lifelong Homewood resident, said that a restaurant or loft development would be a good fit for the property.

Moody emphasized that the decision to open the RFP was driven solely by the sudden interest from other developers, and it was not related to the quality of DiCarlo and Harris’s proposal or the negotiation process. The pair originally offered $50,000 for the city lot. Before the city council voted for the RFP, DiCarlo and Harris had raised their bid to $135,000, the city’s original purchase price, with the request of incentives to offset the excavation and construction costs.

They have not decided if they will submit The Grove for the RFP. If not, DiCarlo said she isn’t sure if they’ll try to move the development to another location, as Patriot Park and Homewood are “near and dear” to them. 

“I think it’s a shame that we weren’t able to come to an agreement,” DiCarlo said. “Honestly, I think we’re going to have to see what kind of support we would have from out council persons and the community at large to determine if we’re going to go forward … I’d like to see some writing on the wall, I guess.”

DiCarlo and Harris have been friends for 10 years. Their children started school at Hall-Kent Elementary and graduated from Homewood High School together. Since they began developing the idea for The Grove, both have solicited community ideas about what development would best fit the community. 

“It was like a mission for us,” DiCarlo said. “We felt like we could contribute to build something exciting.” 

The number of positive reactions they have received, from residents and City Council members, since proposing The Grove could sway DiCarlo and Harris to take part in the RFP process. If they participate and win the bid, the duo already has an architect, contractor and builder ready to begin construction.

“I think our ideas and what we wanted to do was something that was supported by the community,” DiCarlo said. “We have what it takes and we have what we need to move forward, we just need to gauge and see what happens.”

Proposals submitted to the city by Aug. 31 will be considered on Sept. 14. A decision will be finalized by Sept. 28, and the council plans to award a bid at its first October meeting. For more information on the RFP process, call the Homewood Department of Building Inspections at 332-6800.