Passage of tax plan to call for construction, demolition

• By SCOTT DYER
• Advocate staff writer
• Published: Oct 27, 2008 - UPDATED: 12:05 a.m.

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Plans to expand the River Center and its parking as part of Mayor-President Kip Holden’s $989 million construction proposal have apparently put a small piece of Baton Rouge’s past on a collision course with its future.

To make room for a massive, 1,300-space parking garage south of Government Street, the mayor’s plan would demolish former Parish Attorney Wade Shows’ law office at 628 St. Louis St. The building was put on the National Register of Historic Places in 1980 as part of the Beauregard Town Historic District.

East Baton Rouge Parish voters are slated to decide Nov. 4 whether to approve two new taxes to finance Holden’s plan, which includes a $75 million expansion of the River Center and $69 million for two parking garages.

City-parish officials say that if they have to resort to expropriation to get Shows’ office, they will.

Shows promises a fight, saying he wants to preserve a historically significant structure. He said the building was a fraternity house in the 1930s, when LSU was in transition between the Pentagon Barracks and the current campus. He said the old Delta Sigma Phi fraternity house isn’t for sale.

However, Shows said he’s not sure what protection, if any, the historic designation affords his law office. Records show the fraternity bought the raw land in 1932, and built and occupied the structure during the 1930s, he said.

The budget for the proposed south garage would pay $77.50 per square foot for land, or a total of $9.3 million for 119,994 square feet. At that rate, Shows could expect to receive $558,000 for his law office, assessed at $700,000.

“I wouldn’t sell it for $7 million,” Shows said.

Shows said that in addition to the law office, he has a parking lot next door, which increases his total land holdings to about 17,500 square feet.

Walter Monsour, the mayor’s chief administrative officer, said $77.50 per square foot is more than fair.

“I have negotiated with Penn National Gaming for the purchase of the vacant property at the corner of Government and St. Louis at $40 per square foot, conditioned on the bond issue passing,” Monsour added.

The expansion of the River Center is being touted by Monsour and Holden as a major step that will let Baton Rouge attract bigger conventions.

The 522-space West Garage would be razed to make room for the River Center expansion. The East Garage would be enlarged by 800 spaces. The new 1,300-space South Garage, built south of Government, would have a “skyway” passenger bridge to the River Center.
Monsour noted that in the past, the River Center has been improved and expanded with state capital-outlay money and 50 percent local matches. It might take 20 to 30 years to make the proposed improvements under that system, he said.