A local developer said he made an offer to buy the PNC Center building at 1 Cascade Plaza in Akron for more than the current bidder, but his proposal was rebuffed.
The 23-story tower in Akron’s downtown is to be sold for $2.8 million to an unidentified buyer from Northeast Ohio in a deal that’s expected to close next month, Signal Akron reported in September. That buyer signed a letter of intent to buy the PNC Center from its current owner, the Development Finance Authority of Summit County. The DFA has not publicized who that buyer is, and the buyer has not come forward.
But Joe Scaccio, the president and owner of Akron-based J-RS Cos., said he offered to pay more for the building — $3 million — and was disappointed that inquiries he made last summer to the DFA didn’t result in an opportunity for him to purchase the tower. He said he expected the PNC Center to cost three times as much as it did and didn’t know why his interest hadn’t been entertained.
“If they want to give it away and they’re allowed to do it, I don’t have any say in the matter,” he said. “I think the deal is done, as unbelievable as it is.”
In addition to the $2.8 million purchase price, Akron City Council is considering forgiving up to $170,000 in deferred lease payments the city is owed, Sean Vollman, the deputy director of economic development for the city, told Signal Akron previously.
The city owns the land under the PNC Center and leased it for the development. It paused the payments when the DFA took over the building from its previous owner. City Council was due to vote on the proposal in September but has not done so — it’s essentially in a legislative waiting room until Council Member Jeff Fusco, chair of the Planning & Economic Development committee, brings it back for a vote.
Fusco said via text message Friday that he was traveling.
Plans to fill PNC Center
Scaccio’s offer came to light after he sent Fusco a letter Oct. 4 saying he was interested in PNC Center. Scaccio said in the letter he was willing to pay the money that was owed on the ground lease on the building instead of asking for it to be forgiven.
His letter came after his attorney wrote to council about the building Sept. 27. Scaccio’s follow-up was meant to “further enhance” his company’s proposal, he wrote. He also offered in the letter to make improvements to the building and the plaza “outside of its existing property parameters” and to obtain 100% occupancy with high-wage, quality tenants, even if it meant charging below-market rent.
“I am extremely committed to being part of the re-birth of the downtown Akron community,” he wrote.
Vollman said previously the building was 55% occupied. He also said his understanding was that the buyers who had signed a letter of intent intended to continue to use the building as office space. Scaccio said he would do that as well.
“Offices are going to come back because so many of them are being repurposed into residential, torn down, not built,” he said. “I’m willing to do some improvements over and above.”
Rachel Bridenstine, the vice president of the DFA, said in a text message that she and president Chris Burnham had no comment on the sale. The deal with the current buyer is expected to close by the end of the year, Burnham said previously.
Scaccio said the DFA told him he was in a No. 2 position if the existing buyer walked away, but “I don’t see that happening, so I think I’m out.”
He claimed that he had approached the DFA first about buying the building and said he didn’t understand why he hadn’t been able to proceed with a purchase — or at least a more formal proposal.
“Forget the fact that I was asking about it first,” he said. “If you’re selling your house, would you not want another offer? Especially when it’s that low.”
‘I’ve got the cash’ for PNC Center
In addition to his offer to improve the building, Scaccio said improvements to the plaza could include bike racks, seating and shelter, but he said he had no specific plans and would be willing to do “whatever’s needed.”
“We want to make it attractive,” he said.
In his letter, Scaccio cited his history of buying and filling up buildings such as the Merriman Valley Plaza and Lock 22 Plaza as evidence of his successes. The Merriman Valley Plaza was half occupied when he took over in 2018, he wrote, and fully occupied after six months. Lock 22 Plaza was 75% vacant for “many years,” he wrote, but fully occupied two months after he acquired it in 2022.
“Here I am, I want to buy the building and I find that I’ve been passed by,” he told Signal Akron. “I’ve got the cash to write the check; I don’t understand it.”
Burnham said previously the DFA had spent about $2 million to upgrade the building, including paying off bonds that funded the updating of the boiler, getting the elevator certified and covering the bills of a security firm that had not been paid by the previous owner.
Proceeds of the sale would allow the DFA to recoup its costs then share the remainder of the funds with the government agencies that didn’t get their taxes paid when the DFA took over from the previous owners.
Scaccio said he thought the DFA could have gotten more.
“That offer is a joke,” he said, calling it bad for the people of Akron. “The truth of the matter is, I think there’s probably a lot more people than just me that would jump all over it at that price.”