TrueNorth aims to stay downtown

TrueNorth wants to stay downtown and is now negotiating with a property owner to buy a lot where it will build a new office building, TrueNorth President Duane Smith said Thursday.

The company could vacate its current site to make way for the city's new public library as soon as the summer of 2011 and company officials know they must vacate the property by December 2011 to make way for construction.

How long TrueNorth's relocation takes will depend on how quickly the company can find and buy a new lot, Smith said, though he declined to name a specific location.

“Our first choice as far as a new location is still downtown, and we're fairly confident that we can find a lot and a location down here,” said Smith, 52.

TrueNorth doesn't own the building it occupies across Fourth Avenue SE from Greene Square Park, but expects to close on the property Monday. A deal with Busse Investments LLC has been in the works for months, Smith said.

The City Council decided Wednesday to build the new $45 million public library in the block where TrueNorth, an insurance company, now sits. The building, where 120 people work, will be demolished to make way for a library that faces the Cedar Rapids Museum of Art across Greene Square Park.

The council earlier had discussed the TrueNorth block as a possible location for a ground transportation facility, as an extension of Greene Square Park and as a place for a city-county government building. The library board ruled out the location and recommended the council pick the Gazette Communications block, but council members opted for the TrueNorth site on Wednesday night.

TrueNorth's first choice was to stay at its current location, Smith said. The American Legion once occupied the building, and it was later a Legion Lanes bowling alley. It was converted into an office building in 1995 and TrueNorth moved there in 2002.

“Wearing our corporate citizens' hat, we do think this is a great location for the library,” Smith said.

Including demolition, relocation expenses, flood mitigation and TrueNorth's asking price, the site will cost $8.45 million. The Federal Emergency Management Agency will pay $3.68 million of that cost.

The block was surrounded by water in the June 2008 flood, but the building took on water in only small lower-level sections on the east and west ends. The east section took on an inch of water, and the west section took on 6 to 8t inches, Smith said. The water came up through elevator shaft drainage pipes that weren't capped, he said.

“Most of that could have been avoided if we had known about the elevator problem,” Smith said.