Schwartz Building residential conversion to lessen glut of outdated Downtown office space

Downtown's Schwartz Building will be renovated into 20 apartments and 6,705 square feet of street-level retail and will be built to LEED Silver standards.

On August 7, the City authorized a Community Reinvestment Area LEED tax exemption with Black Iron Capital LLC for the $400,000 project to convert the largely vacant, 33,525-square-foot office property at 906-908 Main Street over to residential use.

Work is scheduled to begin this month, with the first apartments becoming available in December 2015.

The 12-year agreement will save the developer $108,787 over the life of the agreement.

Black Iron Capital LLC purchased the 93-year-old building in March for $446,000.