A development project in Delray Beach that has been delayed for years is back on the table.
The Community Redevelopment Agency will take another look at the Uptown Atlantic Project along Atlantic Avenue from the 600 block to the 800 block.
The city is currently in negotiations with a developer with the project that was approved by a former CRA board, but now city commissioners but decide if that is the project they want to continue with.
“I am excited because I have been waiting for the past 20 years,” said Norciebien Monhomme who has owned a barber shop for 28 years in the 700 block of Atlantic.
Monhomee said the thinks this is the time the city will actually move forward with the project, and he said he has been told the city will keep him in the redevelopment plans.
In current negations with the developer, the city has asked that two of the four business in the project we relocated during construction and then added to the final development.
“It is concerning to not even be spoken to, talked about with no options,” said EJS director Dupree Jackson.
He said his non-profit has not been included in the plans for redevelopment and he is worried his non-profit will have nowhere to do.
Jackson started an after-school program and summer camp for kids, he said he just moved into this new building in January.
Mayor Shelly Petrolia said the city will work with EJS to help find them another location, “We have a lot of properties in town that could be suitable for them.”
Petrolia said the CRA will have to decide if they want to continue a project that was approved by the former CRA board, or if they want to start over and delay the work another few years.
“The question is when, and that is the real issue we are faced with, do we want a project sooner than later, are we going to get more out of a project if we wait later,” she said.
The CRA will have to decide during the Thursday meeting if they want to continue with the Uptown Atlantic development that is being negotiated or do they want this project to go back to the drawing board and ask for new ideas.
The meeting is scheduled for 6 p.m. Thursday.
