Rice Creek Commons board to part with TCAAP site developer citing sluggish pace

The board overseeing the development of the 427-acre Rice Creek Commons project in Arden Hills said it plans to part with its developer after months of sluggish talks left numerous pieces of the ambitious project yet to be negotiated.

The formal breakup won’t happen until June 30, the deadline that was set two years ago for the developer, St. Louis Park-based Alatus, to hammer out a development agreement for the complex housing and commercial project.

Alatus founder and principal Bob Lux came to Wednesday’s meeting to ask for a 60-day extension, but the five-member board opted instead to let the agreement expire.

“I think the clock has run out,” said Kurt Weber, an Arden Hills City Council member who also serves on the Rice Creek Commons Joint Development Authority. That five-member panel includes two Arden Hills City Council members, two Ramsey County commissioners, and one appointed Arden Hills resident.

The board plans to hold a workshop during their July 7 meeting to discuss their next steps.

A call to the main phone number at Alatus on Thursday was not immediately returned.

The vision for development at Rice Creek Commons, the site in Arden Hills that was once home to the Twin Cities Army Ammunition Plant, is ambitious: carbon-neutral, fully electric and highly efficient. It calls for geothermal heating, houses that run entirely on electricity, and extensive bike paths and parks winding around and through the residential and commercial areas envisioned there.

Planning for the former Superfund site that required extensive cleanup due to contamination from ammunition manufacturing has stretched over decades.

The joint board signed a preliminary development agreement with Alatus in 2023, granting the firm exclusive development rights to Rice Creek Commons. The agreement set a goal of August, 2024, for a completed development agreement, but that date came and went with much of the work unfinished.

A three-page memo from Wednesday’s board meeting outlining the remaining work listed everything from financing and security to garbage collection and parks. Board members gave some consideration to Lux’s request for an extension, but said too much work remains to get it done even with an extra 60 days.

“There’s so much that’s left to be finished. That’s what’s disappointing,” Ramsey County Commissioner Tara Jebens-Singh said. “I feel as if we have an outline but we haven’t been able to put flesh on the bones, so to speak.”

A portion of the project got underway earlier this year with the groundbreaking for a new office, the headquarters of the Micro Control Company’s headquarters. The 157,000-square-foot building will rise on a portion of the TCAAP land known as Outlot A, a 40-acre parcel on the north end of Rice Creek Commons that is zoned for commercial use.

Board member and Ramsey County Commissioner Mary Jo McGuire said the board remains committed to moving quickly on their Rice Creek Commons vision.

“We are very committed to getting this project done,” she said Wednesday night. “That’s our top priority, to get this developed in a good way and we want to find the partner that can get us there.”