Stockton's Atlantic City campus to receive $68.3M in tax breaks

The New Jersey Economic Development Authority approved $68.3 million in tax credits Tuesday toward the development of Stockton University's planned residential campus in Atlantic City.

The EDA approved up to $38.4 million for construction of a residence hall and academic building and up to $29.9 million for construction of a parking garage. The project is planned for about six acres at the southern end of Atlantic City, by the intersection of Atlantic, Albany, and Pacific Avenues.

"This is another positive step in developing the public-private partnerships that will enable Stockton to move forward with the AC Devco project for a residential campus and academic facilities, benefiting both our students and the region," said Harvey Kesselman, president of Stockton.

Stockton's campus plans are being developed by Atlantic City Development Corp., a nonprofit group recently formed as an offshoot of the New Brunswick Development Corp. Both development corporations jointly applied for the state tax breaks.

The plans call for construction of a five-story, 210,000-square-foot dormitory, housing 500 students.

Across the street, the development groups plan a separate building that would devote 56,000 square feet to classrooms, a trading floor classroom, a technology lab, and other academic and administrative spaces. That building would also have 7,000 square feet set aside for retail.

Those projects would cost about $124.8 million. Stockton would directly contribute $18 million from the sale of the Showboat casino property; the development groups would contribute $2 million; and the Casino Redevelopment Authority would give $17 million to Stockton for the site. An additional $60.8 million would come from housing-supported bonds, and $27 million would come from tax-credit loans.

Construction is scheduled to begin in April, once funding is completed. The project would be completed in June 2018, according to the EDA memo based on the funding applications.

Construction of the seven-story parking garage is set to follow the same timeline. It would include 886 parking spaces over 332,500 square feet, with 7,500 square feet of retail on the ground floor.

On the top would be 72,000 square feet of new office space for South Jersey Gas' parent company, South Jersey Industries, which in August was approved for a $12 million tax credit to relocate 167 employees to the new space.

The parking garage would cost roughly $35 million, funded with $21.6 million in tax credit bonds, $7.3 million in parking-supported bonds, $6 million from South Jersey Industries, and $104,000 in a deferred fee from the developer.

Completion would give Stockton the residential campus in Atlantic City that it has tried multiple times to create. It came closest when it purchased the former Showboat casino site in December 2014 with plans to convert it into a campus, but that became untenable due to a web of legal issues. The university is now slated to sell that property to Philadelphia-based developer Bart Blatstein.

Source: Philly.com