On Tuesday night, the Northfield City Council approved the sale of the former Northfield News building at 115 5th Street West to Loon Liquors. The company intends to dramatically remodel the building to create what the owners call a “Destination Distillery.
In June of 2022, the City of Northfield purchased the property for $1.2 million. At the time, the plan was to build a new municipal liquor store on the site where the current one stands and to use the Northfield News building as a temporary home for the liquor store during construction. However, with changed plans, the building became available.
At the same time, the owners of Loon Liquors, Mark Schiller and Simeon Rossi, were engaged in negotiations with the City of Northfield and the United States Postal Service about buying the downtown post office which would have been their new home. Schiller said, however, that the USPS was taking far longer than time allowed for Loon. With capacity and space needs at an almost urgent level for the company, they had to look elsewhere. As it turned out, the Northfield News Building, which is more than 7500 square feet on the ground level, was an excellent place to look next.
Mayor Rhonda Pownell said the idea of buying property and holding it is not something the city government had done before, because the Housing and Redevelopment Authority and the Economic Development Authority have programs to handle that, and the administrative branch of the city does not. However, she said, the City Council saw an opportunity when the building was purchased, and it turned out to be a good one.
“If a city doesn’t have property, businesses will go elsewhere. This was an opportunity for us. I’m just really thankful that we have a key building downtown that was available. Our city staff, and many others, worked really hard with an existing business to create this opportunity for them to grow and expand right here within our borders.”
Loon will pay approximately $996,000 for the building, based on an independent appraisal, leaving a gap, according to the city financial advisor Nick Anhut, of about $290,000. The city intends to use tax abatement, with an assist from Rice County, to make up the
of Northfield. Bringing a vibrant business such as Loon downtown and helping them expand will only enhance the city’s economy. Schiller said Loon is focused on offering a rare experience to their visitors.
“We’re really looking to also set this up for tours and tourism. The last thing a lot of distilleries think about is showing folks the craft of distilling. We want to do that. We want to show you our equipment and how we do things. Let’s give you a tour. There are only, I think, about four distilleries in the state that offer tours. We’re looking to offer that as the main attraction.”
With a quickly expanding demand for their products, and more products being offered, the owners of Loon Liquor are very eager to begin the renovation project. Schiller said they hope to be moved in and operating downtown sometime in early 2025.
Downtown Northfield could expand upwards
One of the goals for the next Northfield Comprehensive plan is to offer guidance for real managed growth within the city limits. Betsey Buckheit, the Chair of the Northfield Planning Commission and one of the leaders of the Comprehensive Plan project, said things have progressed to the point where the planners are now looking at Northfield as a whole and evaluating where more investment should go, where the best return on investment would be, and what parts of the city have been underutilized.
One of the underutilized sections of town is nearly the entire West side. The west side of Highway 3 has been underdeveloped, lacking in retail stores, park lands and leaving many West Siders feeling like they are on an island. Buckheit said addressing the issues caused by Highway 3 on the West side of Northfield will be addressed in the new plan.
“We’re looking to how we can make Highway 3 as street-like as possible. The West side of Highway 3 through downtown has been problematic for a long time; it’s not being used as completely as it could be. We heard a lot of that from people this time around saying, ‘Gee if only we could cross Highway 3 things would be a lot easier for heading back and forth from neighborhoods to downtown.’”
Another idea the project will address is an expansion of Downtown Northfield. The city has much more space to develop, like the Northwest Area, but Buckheit said that land will be expensive to develop because of the infrastructure needs. The city, she believes, should be looking to take advantage of growth areas where the infrastructure is already in place, and Downtown Northfield could actually offer more possibilities.
“Downtown is incredibly valuable, tax wise, with multiple stories on not too much land. Is there more in that kind of pattern – a little bit more vertical than horizontal – around downtown that we could do that would really generate very rich tax base without much cost to infrastructure at all?”
Other options being considered are more housing near Hillcrest Village, creating more density in the area, and taking further steps to connect outer neighborhoods like Mayflower Hill and Wang’s Woods with the rest of Northfield.
Buckheit said the Comprehensive plan Steering Committee is expected to meet within the next month to evaluate the ideas and offer their input.
KYMN News 4/25/24
Rich Larson is the KYMN News Director. Contact him at rich@kymnradio.net
