Mill Market strikes a deal to move downtown

After a half-dozen years in a converted fish hatchery at 35 Canal Drive, Sault Ste. Marie's Mill Market is set to move downtown under a deal expected to receive approval at today's City Council meeting.

Councillors will be asked to spend $385,000 to buy 73 Brock St. and an adjoining building at 64 Bingham St. – which the market's board has agreed to combine into a new public market.

Currently owned by Lesley and Butch Wilson, the Brock/Bingham locations served for years as the Sault's Greyhound intercity bus terminal and repair facility.

The buildings, nestled between the Bay Street Tim Horton's and the Country Way health food store, have more recently been occupied by Union Cab.

The idea is to make the new market part of the downtown plaza currently being developed by city officials.

Tom Vair, the city's deputy chief administrative officer for community development and enterprise services, says Mill Market's board of directors has "expressed enthusiasm" for the new location.

"The location of the market is an important consideration for the design of the plaza and provides an opportunity to maximize the synergies that exist between the plaza and market," Vair said in a report to Mayor Provenzano and City Council.

Roger Brooks International, a U.S.-based consultant retained by the city and Downtown Association, recommended that the Sault's new plaza be "joined at the hip" to a public market.

An appraisal done for the city valued the adjoining Brock Street and Bingham properties at a total of $375,000.

"The city also completed a building condition assessment," Vair said.

The proposed $385,000 purchase price is reasonable, Vair says, "considering the appraisal, legal fees/ disbursements to be paid and the fact that the property owner will incur relocation expenses."

The city will conduct environmental investigations on the site before the purchase deal closes.

In 2014, the city granted Justus Veldman's Mill Market Inc. a five-year contract allowing it to use the old municipal hatchery site rent-free.

That arrangement expired last year, and the market was taken over by a nonprofit vendors group.

The city will pay for the Union Cab facility using funds from its property purchase reserve fund, which currently contains $600,000.

Mill Market will continue under the same lease terms that have applied to the former hatchery site near the Sault Locks and Francis H. Clergue Generating Station.

"The market will apply for funding to aid in leasehold improvements to transition the space and the city will aid in this endeavour where appropriate," says Brent Lamming, who is both the city's director of community services and chair of the Mill Market board.

"The market is looking forward to being a major component of the plaza space and in providing a valuable service to our community," Lamming said.

Subject to any last-minute changes related to the COVID-19 emergency, SooToday is planning to livestream tonight's City Council meeting starting at 4:30 p.m.