TOWER—The prospects for a planned town home project here appear increasingly in question as a key deadline nears without the necessary plat that developers will need to meet the terms of a development agreement with the city of Tower.

Under the latest version of that agreement, signed in early January, Tower Harbor Shores (THS) LLC has until April 1 to complete a sufficient number of purchase agreements to commit to building the first of three planned units. Yet with just ten days to go until that deadline is reached, the city has still not delivered a finalized project plat, which the developers need to execute purchase agreements.

It’s not clear why officials from the city and St. Louis County have been unable to deliver a plat more than a year and a half after the issue first came up in discussions between the city’s engineer, Matt Bolf, of SEH, and the project’s developers. The Timberjay did reach out to Bolf with questions for this story. He did not respond.

St. Louis County Surveyor Nick Stewart said the process hasn’t been unusually long from his perspective, although he acknowledged that the proposed plat is a complex one. “It’s not a surprise that it is where it is,” he said. The plat is complex because it extends well beyond the footprint of the town home project, encompassing other city lands in and around the harbor and nearby industrial park.

THS project manager Jeremy Schoenfelder said it’s his understanding that the hang-ups with the plat aren’t even related to the portion encompassing the town homes, but that’s slim comfort as the development team has sat in “hurry up and wait mode” for months as the process drags on. “I’m hard pressed to understand what we’ve done to cause delays in that platting,” he said.

When Bolf first raised the issue in July 2017, city officials and developers feared that the platting could push the start of construction on the project off until 2018. Yet more than 18 months later, the 2018 construction season is ancient history and the failure to complete the plat to date is now putting the 2019 construction season in doubt and could well doom the project entirely.

Schoenfelder said there’s no question that the THS development team will need to request an extension on the April 1 deadline. “At this point, we’re stuck,” he said. “We really can’t even market the properties without having a finalized plat.”

Yet any significant delay beyond the April 1 deadline puts another building season at risk. “The challenge is going to be coordinating with our builder,” said Schoenfelder. “I’ve been hedging with them because of the situation.” THS is currently planning to work with Dynamic Homes to deliver portions of the town homes in modular fashion, but the setup and planning for that process takes considerable lead time. Schoenfelder acknowledges that the continuing delay on the plat is frustrating. “I sort of shake my head, but I don’t know what else I can do to push this forward,” he said. “I still think that it’s feasible to do if we can get this finalized quickly,” he said.

If not, the prospects for the project would appear to be at serious risk.

That would be unfortunate, said longtime Lake Vermilion area realtor Mark Ludlow, who says he remains confident the project could be successful even as delays have sapped some enthusiasm from potential buyers.

“I think the interest will be renewed when there is finally opportunity to see the final product,” he said. “There was a lot of interest initially, but people get tired of waiting. A lot of the delay is related to not having a plat done yet. You can’t sell anything without a plat.”

In lieu of purchase agreements, Ludlow said Tower Harbor Shores has used letters of intent, with $10,000 down payments that are placed in escrow, and said they had about four such letters last he checked, although one buyer has since asked for his money back citing the delays.

Ludlow said it’s always difficult to sell residential property based on a floor plan. “Once one building is up, it should be a lot easier to make sales,” he said.

Ludlow said he thinks there is considerable interest in the type of residential arrangement the town home project would bring to Tower. “The concept is wonderful,” he said. “You have access to Lake Vermilion, from town, with a residence you can just lock and leave.” He said a good deal of the demand thus far is coming from people who already have homes on the lake who are looking for a lower maintenance option.

That’s consistent with the findings of a market study by Maxfield Research that the city of Tower commissioned in 2015. That study found a potential market for 145 town home or condominium units in Tower with access to Lake Vermilion. Based on that research, the city issued a Request for Qualifications in late 2015 seeking a contractor to develop a city-led town home project. That RFQ led to the involvement of Tower Harbor Shores and Tower Vision 2025 in the effort, but city officials subsequently required the developer to take on more and more of the risk for the project.

After years of waiting for permits and plats, the development team has experienced changes that are affecting the project. The former lead developer, Orlyn Kringstad, is now the mayor of Tower and has since divested himself from ownership and any involvement, although he remains a supporter of the project given its potential benefits to the city. While Schoenfelder, who is based in Arizona, has taken over as project manager, he has since become heavily involved in some other start-up projects that are taking considerable time.

Michael Wood, of Biwabik, is an investor in the THS project and says the platting delay has been a serious problem and he remains uncertain where the development goes if something doesn’t change soon. “It’s almost like Tower Harbor Shores is bouncing on the waves right now,” he said.