Glendale officials are weighing plans for a new development district that would allow Milwaukee developer Cobalt Partners, LLC to redevelop the the office building that previously held the North Shore Library into mixed-use residential and commercial spaces.
The property at the center of the proposed Coventry Commons redevelopment, 6800 N. Port Washington Road, has seen prolonged vacancy, Cobalt’s president and CEO, Scott Yauck, told Glendale’s Planning and Architectural Review Commission on June 2.
The North Shore Library’s transition from the first floor of the building to the $200 million One North Development in Bayside in late 2025 brought the property to 100% vacancy, according to Cobalt’s application materials.
On June 2, the commission voted 6-1 on a resolution to recommend rezoning the site to the planned development district as requested in Cobalt’s general development plan submitted to the city on March 24. The rezoning will appear before the council for a a public hearing and vote June 8.
In late March, the City of Glendale sold the building for $750,000 to LIV Enterprises LLC, which is helmed by William La Macchia, according to Wisconsin Department of Revenue records. The estimated value of buildings in the proposal is more than $10 million, according to the Cobalt’s application materials.
LaMacchia and Cobalt are the developers behind the One North project, which also includes the Symphony Apartments building; the Artalia, a million apartment community for seniors; and a mixed-use development with 180 luxury apartment units, a health and fitness club and a full‑service grocer. The new North Shore Library space, on the first floor of the Symphony Apartments building, was donated to the library by La Macchia. The gift amounted to roughly $4 million and helped kick-start fundraising for the new project.
The proposed mixed-use planned development district would enable the developer to privately invest in readapting the building and its surrounding parking lots toward residential, commercial, service-oriented uses, which the developers sees are more aligned with market demand, according to the proposal.
The project would have four zones, according to the general development plan:
The district covers 4.33 acres. The 3.5-story building’s has 60,000 square feet.
The commission’s approval came with conditions, including a requirement that the developer submit a traffic impact study
The sole commissioner to vote against the project, Amanda Seligman, expressed misgivings about the commercial portions and the unknowns of Zone 4.
Seligman asked whether the developer had considered a proposal focused solely on housing.
Yauck said they did consider that route but found costs to be so high they would have needed to seek tax incremental financing. However, Glendale’s city code on use of tax incremental financing requires that environmental concerns must be present at a site to trigger discussions on TIF.
The area was previously under a TIF in 1975 to address environmental contamination and develop both the office and library building and the nearby Coventry Apartments, Mayor Bryan Kennedy said.
The general development plan offers a high level overview of the proposal, but more details about the costs of the project, the residential component and the building design will come in future applications to be discussed by the council.
Cobalt hopes to start construction on Zone 3 by the third quarter of 2026, and the project would take place in phases, according to the development narrative. Zone 1 would be developed next, followed by Zone 2.
Contact Claudia Levens at clevens@usatodayco.com. Follow her on X at @levensc13.
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Could the vacant North Shore Library building become restaurants and apartments?
Reporting by Claudia Levens, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
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By Claudia Levens, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel | USA TODAY Network
