Vandals ransack vacant downtown St. Paul office tower

Vandals ransacked a floor of the Alliance Bank Center, a downtown St. Paul office tower that was vacated two months ago, after the last office tenants left.

The building has been locked and skyway access blocked, but security guards no longer patrol the building.

St. Paul police say people broke in, emptied fire extinguishers and threw appliances around a floor of the tower, trashing part of the 16-story building that is valued at less than a third of the 2019 purchase price.

The damage was discovered this week, when police checked out reports that people had been going into the Alliance Center, said city spokesperson Jennifer Lor in an email.

Police found a story of the building “destroyed by emptied fire extinguishers, throwing appliances and various other damage to property and vandalism,” Lor wrote. It wasn’t clear Friday which floor had been trashed.

Police are investigating, she said,

“What happened at Alliance Bank Center is a crime,” Lor said. “Our priority remains keeping the building safe for our first responders and keeping the public safe while the building is not occupied.”

Madison Equities bought the building in 2019 for more than $18 million as the company snapped up property across downtown St. Paul. The company planned major investments to convert other office towers to hotels and apartments.

But plunging office occupancy meant the value of the building has plummeted.

After COVID-19, court records show Madison Equities has repeatedly appealed the tax valuation of the property, arguing it was worth less than the current valuation of just over $5 million.

Ramsey County records show Madison Equities put just over $3 million down on the purchase.

When the building was last sold in early 2019, all 200,000 square feet of office space was leased out. Pre-pandemic, the skyway level was home to murals and buzzy lunch spots.

But the building no longer has any office tenants, and the property managers gave the skyway businesses the boot in March, informing them that utilities would be shut off, and Madison Equities would stop providing security at the empty tower.

The company’s St. Paul portfolio has been on the market for over a year since Madison founder Jim Crockarell’s death. Another Madison property, the Lowry apartment building, was condemned in December.

Right now, St. Paul is just trying to keep the building secure, but city leaders hope there’s a better day ahead for the Alliance Bank Center.

“In the short term we’re working really hard to keep it safe,” said City Council President Rebecca Noecker, whose Ward 2 includes downtown. “That’s not the long-term strategy,” she said.

Noecker said there is “serious interest” in the Alliance Center from a potential buyer, but she declined to elaborate.

“I am really hopeful that building will be in better hands in the near future,” Noecker said.

But she said it is possible that the future of downtown St. Paul will not include the Alliance building at all. A buyer might decide to demolish part or all of the building, she said.

Maybe a plaza or a park would be a better neighbor in downtown St. Paul, Noecker said, especially as the city pushes more office-to-apartment conversions in the city’s core.

“It’s going to be up to the market to decide what makes sense,” she said.