The developer chosen eight years ago by Mecklenburg County to build Brooklyn Village in Second Ward uptown said Wednesday that it can’t start building apartments until 2026.
Some Mecklenburg commissioners, who selected the Peebles Corporation in 2016 for the project, were furious. They asked about their legal options to get out of the contract.
Brooklyn Village is a high-profile project, in part, because it’s meant to make amends for the destruction of a once-majority Black neighborhood in the 1960s. The Brooklyn neighborhood was bulldozed as part of urban renewal programs nationwide.
The Peebles Corporation had told the county by letter in May that construction on new apartments wouldn’t begin until 2025. That’s when the group is contractually obligated to start building.
At Wednesday’s Commission meeting, Donahue Peebles III said it now looks like the start of the $1 billion project will be pushed back another year. That would make it a decade after the deal with the county was signed — and finishing the project could stretch a decade beyond that.
In a presentation to commissioners, he painted a grim picture of the economy.
In addition to the office market struggling, he said interest rates are too high and a glut of new apartments in Charlotte is depressing rents. Building now doesn't make economic sense, he said.
Commissioner Laura Meier said she didn’t believe that. She asked why other developers have been able to build thousands of apartments since the pandemic.
Commissioner Pat Cotham, one of the few commissioners in office eight years ago, said she isn’t surprised.
“We had a vote on it multiple times and I voted no four times,” she said. “I’m not surprised.”
Elaine Powell agreed.
“There is a significant part of the population that is outraged about how long this is taking,” she said.
Commission chair George Dunlap, who at times defended Peebles, said he would ask the county attorney to research what options the county has.
The Peebles Corporation partnered with Charlotte-based Conformity Corporation for the project, under the name BK Partners.
