Federal research complex back to drawing boards

FORT COLLINS — The federal government’s long-awaited Natural Resources Research Center in the Centre for Advanced Technology might not happen there at all.

The General Services Administration, essentially the property manager for the federal government, has drastically changed its approach to constructing the research complex here. The NRRC, as the project is known, is supposed to consolidate approximately 1,000 existing U.S. Department of Agriculture and Department of Interior jobs in a campus-like atmosphere.

The 300,000-square-foot to 400,000-square-foot project has been estimated to cost $60 million to $70 million and be completed in five stages over 10 years.

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While all involved maintain the project still will happen, it also will undeniably now be delayed.

The GSA has long been in negotiations with Colorado State University to construct the NRRC on CSU-owned land in the Centre for Advanced Technology, a 235-acre business and research park at the northeast corner of Drake Road and Shields Street. It’s jointly managed by the Colorado State University Research Foundation and the Everitt Cos.

Negotiations were nearing a promising close recently, when GSA officials decided they simply could not reconcile with CSU the final stumbling block of lease negotiations.

The GSA abruptly issued nationwide requests for interest from developers to build the NRRC on a site of the developer’s choice within Fort Collins’ planning area. That means any 30-acre site within or near the city potentially could host the project.

Developers had until mid-last month to respond to the request, and several apparently have done so. However, the GSA isn’t officially issuing any names yet.

What this means is that the entire NRRC process, which already has taken several years, will essentially begin again.

“From a timing standpoint, there’s no question that there is a potential effect,´ said Art Cudworth, who has acted as the federal government’s real estate broker on the project. He is leaving his position this month, however.

At issue in the ill-fated negotiations is a problem that often plagues universities attempting commercial developments on their own land – the land lease itself.

Under the scenario being negotiated by CSU and the government, any buildings constructed on university land would in 20 years become CSU property.

“The buildings we would pay to have built would revert to CSU,” Cudworth said. “And in the university deal with the government, there was a large upfront cash deal with the lease that was equal to buying the land.

“The bottom line is we have a fiduciary responsibility to the taxpayers,” Cudworth said. “The offer presented to us by the university was believed by us to not be supportive of market values.

“Our feeling was that in order to build on the university site, with the costs the university set, any deal we did would contain a premium associated with upfront costs,” he added.

A noticeably agitated Jud Harper, vice president for research at CSU, said the Centre for Advanced Technology site is best for both the government and university.

“How this is going to turn out, I don’t know,” Harper said. “I do think a Natural Resources Research Center will be built in Fort Collins.”

Harper insists there is real value in having the NRRC built so close to campus. Both employees of the government and CSU had sung praises of having the NRRC nearby to facilitate joint research and share services.

Cudworth said the agencies that eventually will occupy the NRRC agreed they could not justify cost premiums simply to be closer to the CSU campus, though. He added that an extra three to five miles likely would not upset research relationships.

So now, a private developer will have the responsibility of selecting and negotiating for a site, not the GSA. Developers responding to the requests for information will present their potential sites to the GSA, which then will select the choice site.

The CSU land will remain a contender if any developers chose to work with the university.

“If the CSU site is the most attractive to a developer, then they will present it to us,” Cudworth said, emphasizing that land-lease negotiations and costs would become the burden of the developer, not the government.

Harper confirmed that the CSU site still is generating interest.

“We’ve had contracts from a number of developers,” he said.

One such developer is the Everitt Cos., which co-manages the Centre for Advanced Technology.

“We’re supportive of the research center in the Centre for Advanced Technology,´ said Tom Livingston of the Everitt Cos. “The long-term goal has been to co-locate the government with the campus, but the GSA appropriately has to look out for the best interest of the public.”