It’s now official; the proposed Meridian Square office project in Oakland Mills Village Center is kaput. The developer, Metroventures USA, has announced that they were unable to secure an extension to their purchase agreement with the property owner, Exxon Mobil Corporation and was therefore forced to drop the project.
Curiously, the president of Metroventures, Olusola Seriki, is blaming the county for his failure. According to a story by Derek Simmonsen in the The Columbia Flier, Seriki wrote that “that special conditions the county placed on the project delayed the developer’s ability to secure financing and complete the land purchase.”
What a pile of rubbish!
The county went way out on a limb to help this ill conceived project by agreeing to purchase a full floor in the project. The only thing the county asked the developer to do in return was to prove that there was enough demand for the project in the private sector to make it economically feasible. Metroventures was unable to do that. Now they are blaming the county for their own shortcomings.
Metroventures has shown it has no class.
Reveling in the misfortune of a competitor is pretty classless, too, wb.
ReplyDeleteOf course, it's only business, right? Unfortunately, in this case, not so much. It's a community's future, too, that's at stake, which makes the gloating from you and others about the project's demise particularly galling.
I don't get it. Oakland Mills Village Center is one of the few places in Howard County where developers have a red carpet before them, but instead of taking a walk down it and getting showered with support, you, a developer, choose to lift your leg for a shower of another kind.
Anon 10:24,
ReplyDeleteThis developer was given multiple concessions by the county to help make this project a success. Parking requirements were waived and the county committed to lease an entire floor in no bid process. In return for this assistance, the developer blames the county for its failure. That type of behavior reflects badly on all in our industry and that is why I took them to task.
It was a well deserved shower.
-wb
Considering the money that Metroventures invested in donations to county officials, you can understand their disappointment.
ReplyDelete