Grant Writing Case Study:
Frogtown Square
Many developers overlook traditional granting opportunities as potential components to their capital funding strategies. Ponterre Group consultants are experts in seeing the "big picture" of funding solutions, including identifying granted sources that align well with your project’s timeline, budget and mission-related goals, while simultaneously reducing debt burdens associated with large-scale property development.
Frogtown Square, a mixed-use affordable housing development on the northeast corner of University Avenue and Dale Street in Saint Paul’s Frogtown neighborhood, is an excellent example of how Ponterre creatively used grant funds to complete the complex financial portfolio of a project.
Frogtown Square transformed a blighted, stigmatized cluster of substandard properties into a transit-oriented demonstration project strategically located on the Central Corridor LRT line with:
- 50 units of permanent, affordable senior housing.
- 11,700 square feet of “Class A” commercial/retail space.
- Heated, underground parking.
- A state-of-the-art geothermal HVAC system and other sustainable high-efficiency features.
- More than 40 newly created jobs.
- Direct access to the Dale Street LRT station.
Over the course of three years, Ponterre worked as both Project Manager and Development Consultant, securing thirteen sources of funding attached to various aspects of the project (predevelopment, acquisition, environmental remediation, construction).
To fill a nearly $800,000 gap that remained, and to address a mission-related issue – that the targeted local and minority business owners for the commercial space might be unable to afford high quality tenant improvements – Ponterre sought a creative solution with Federal grant dollars. Consultants designed a Revolving Loan Fund program for the Frogtown neighborhood and, naming Frogtown Square as the first recipient of the fund, received $765,000 from the Federal Office of Community Services to subsidize tenant improvement build-outs at the property. Terms of the loan were designed to be favorable to the operating proforma and allowed the project to cash flow.
This grant not only completed the financial package, but ensured that a major project goal could be reached: creating high quality space for local and minority-owned business owners, and jobs for low-income workers from the neighborhood.
In addition to the Federal grant, Ponterre also secured nearly $100,000 in grant funding for crucial environmental contamination remediation that allowed the project to begin its construction schedule on time.
