Full Spectrum of NY and My Image Studios have closed on financing to
begin construction of an African and Hispanic arts and culture center
on the ground floor of the Kalahari Condominium at 40 West 116th Street, Malcolm X Boulevard and Fifth Avenue, Crain’s reported. BRP
Community Development intends to allocate $21 million in New Market
Tax Credits to the My Image Studios project, which will be located in
the retail space of the Kalahari Condominium,
an affordable housing development between Lenox and Fifth avenues that
was completed in 2008.
Prudential Insurance Company of America has provided an additional loan at the site. The
project had hoped to receive Recovery Zone Facility Bond funding last
year, but that deal did not come to fruition. Construction is
scheduled to begin tomorrow, and the center could open in April.
The
plan calls for three performance spaces that will have a total of 317
seats as well as post-production facilities and a 7,000-square-foot
restaurant and lounge.
Goldman Sachs Urban Investment Group, which
bought the tax credit to provide the debt and equity financing for the arts
project, developed the Kalahari Condominium along with Full Spectrum
and L+M Equity Participants. [Crain’s]