The New Jersey Performing Arts Center in Newark
By Joshua Burd
A sweeping plan to expand the New Jersey Performing Arts Center campus in Newark has secured a 10-year, $200 million tax credit award under the state’s Aspire program, in a key step for a project that would include 350 apartments and new commercial and community spaces.
According to the state Economic Development Authority, which approved the subsidy on Wednesday, construction could begin this summer for the proposed NJPAC District just west of McCarter Highway. Officials noted that the project has three main components, the first of which would include apartments and townhomes with a combined 280 market-rate and 70 affordable units, as well as 10,500 square feet for the Newark-based public radio station WBGO’s new headquarters and 12,600 square feet of ground-floor retail space.
Plans also call for NJPAC to revitalize the existing 100,000-square-foot performing arts center building, which opened in 1997, and the development of a new hub for arts education, the EDA said. The third component involves sitewide infrastructure improvements that will make the development feasible and allow for the new buildings and the construction of several new publicly accessible streets and open spaces.
The nearly $199.7 million Aspire tax credit, which would not be disbursed until after the development is completed, represents 60 percent of the $332.8 million project cost, according to an authority board memo. The EDA considered NJPAC’s proposal under its “transformative project” tier — as established by the Aspire statute — which allows for more lucrative awards for larger developments and those that leverage mass transit, college campuses or other economic development assets to provide housing or create jobs.
“This is another one that has been a long time coming,” said Tim Sullivan, the EDA’s chief executive, speaking to board members on Wednesday. “It is a longstanding Newark goal, Essex County goal, NJPAC goal. So, pending your concurrence, this is a big one.”
Located in the northern end of downtown Newark, NJPAC has helped anchor and draw visitors to the city since its opening in 1997. Supporters have long dreamed of expanding its footprint and creating a vibrant arts district around the venue, but those plans so far have been limited to the 22-story, 245-unit residential tower that opened across Center Street in 2018.
The center announced in 2021 that it was moving ahead with such a plan in tandem with L+M Development Partners. The EDA this week noted that LMXD, an L+M affiliate, is the lead development entity for NJPAC District and will develop and operate the residential phase known as ArtSide, which will include a high-rise tower and a midrise building with a combined 335 apartments, plus 15 low-rise townhomes.
The market-rate units will include 61 studios, 146 one-bedrooms, 49 two-bedrooms and 24 three-bedrooms, while the 20 percent affordable component will comprise seven studios, six one-bedrooms, 40 two-bedrooms and 17 three-bedrooms.
The second component includes the improvements to NJPAC’s main building, which consist of seating and decorative floor replacements to the 68,000-square-foot theater space, renovations to Nico’s Restaurant and an expansion of the 3,000-square-foot loading docks, according to the board memo. NJPAC also aims to repurpose the 18,000-square-foot Center for Arts Education building at 24 Rector St., with plans to preserve a significant portion of the structure and use it as a reformulated auditorium for community meetings and similar uses.
The current services offered at 24 Rector will move to what will be called the Cooperman Center, a new 53,000-square-foot facility for NJPAC’s arts education and community programming with dedicated, modern rehearsal space. The facility will occupy what’s now a surface parking lot at Center and Mulberry streets, adjacent to a 17,000-square-foot Episcopal Church building that NJPAC will acquire and renovate, creating a complex that will include:
- A 175-seat studio theater for educational initiatives and free community events
- A dozen multipurpose classrooms at varying sizes
- A children’s arts reading room
- Office space for NJPAC Arts Education staff
- A suite of professional rehearsal studios with ancillary spaces
According to the EDA, the sitewide infrastructure improvements will support the vertical development. They include relocating a sewer pipe that will introduce water, sewer, gas and power service, as well as establishing a new network of streets and open spaces that will be accessible to the public.
“The Mulberry extension will run between NJPAC and the new development and will be the project’s spine of activity,” the EDA wrote in its memo to board members. “As a shared and curb-less street, the design blurs the separation between pedestrian and vehicular zones, which reduces car traffic and creates a safer zone for pedestrians, while enabling the closure of the street for events.”
The project would also improve NJPAC’s front lawn, known as Chambers Plaza, to further serve as an outdoor venue and community meeting space, the authority said. The plaza will be reconfigured into a public park that is open throughout the year and will host outdoor concerts, farmers markets and a winter skating rink.
NJPAC’s application cites a host of proposed capital sources, including a $184.3 million construction loan from Citibank and a $50 million tax-exempt loan from TD Bank. Goldman Sachs, LMXD and NJPAC are among the project’s equity sources, which also include federal grants and funds tied to New Market Tax Credits and Low-Income Housing Tax Credits.
The EDA on Wednesday also approved a $1.5 million award to NJPAC under its Activation, Revitalization and Transformation Real Estate Grants program. According to the authority, the center requested the monies to fund the acquisition of land for the renovation and adaptive reuse of the former Episcopal Church office building within the proposed NJPAC District footprint.
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