E-Malt.com News article: USA, VA: City Council approves $23 mln in public funding for Stone Brewing Co.

The Richmond City Council gave its last major approval for the first phase of the Stone Brewing Co. project, but the second phase might not go as smoothly, timesdispatch.com reported on December, 8.

Before the vote to approve $23 mln in public funding that will be used to build Stone a 200,000-square-foot brewing facility in the Greater Fulton area, several restaurateurs questioned what they saw as a lack of transparency in the deal and a fairness issue arising from the future plans to build Stone a riverfront bistro and beer garden, again with the assistance of public financing.

The vote to authorize the $23 mln transfer to the Richmond Economic Development Authority, which will build the facility and lease it to Stone, was 7-0-2. Councilman Parker C. Agelasto, 5th District, and Councilwoman Reva M. Trammell, 8th District, abstained after trying unsuccessfully to have the council go into a closed session in order to ask sensitive questions about how the first phase is legally connected to the second.

The funding approval was the last major piece of legislation the council needed to pass before construction could begin on the facility, which is expected to be finished by late next year. The restaurant phase would follow within a few years.
Stone, a major craft brewer based in California, announced in October that it had chosen Richmond for a coveted expansion to the eastern United States, a development touted as bringing 288 jobs.

Craig Spitz, Stone’s chief financial officer, told the council that the company is “really excited and ready to get started.” He also asked local businesses to remember that “a rising tide lifts all boats.”

But several attendees at the meeting, including the owners of Hardywood Park Craft Brewery, questioned what they saw as a wide gap between the assistance being given to Stone and the realities of city government for smaller, homegrown businesses. Though the council was not voting on the restaurant phase, expected to cost an additional $8 mln, many questions centred on why the city is partnering with private enterprise on a restaurant project.

“That would mean we’d be in competition with a city-funded bistro,” said Michael Byrne, director of operations for The Tobacco Company and former owner of Richbrau Brewery. “That’s not good business. That’s not good policy. And the restaurateurs of this city will be listening.”

Josh Bufford, a co-owner of the restaurants Toast, Estilo and Dash: Kitchen + Carry, said his restaurants serve Stone products and his customers enjoy them. But as a taxpayer, he said, the city owes more transparency.

Supporters of the Stone project said it would be a boon to the Greater Fulton area, which has been largely neglected after an urban renewal project razed much of the neighborhood starting in 1970. Some supporters took on the business owners directly.

“I am so upset to see the people who don’t set foot in Fulton to come and try to take this away from us,” said Juliellen Sarver, a Fulton resident.

It’s not clear when the council will be asked to authorize the restaurant phase. Though that too is expected to be financed with public money, it has not yet been decided.

Stone is expected to repay the public investment through a 25-year lease on the brewing facility.


10 December, 2014