Agilent site developers want more time

By Tom Hacker
Reporter-Herald

Developers of the ACE technology manufacturing park on Tuesday told city officials they need more time to consummate a deal on the Agilent Technologies Inc. campus that would house it.
And, they said the transaction would depend on the city's "long-term role" in financing the redevelopment of the site.
The request came near the end of a two-hour meeting that brought the city's negotiating team together with representatives from Minneapolis-based developer United Properties and the Colorado Association for Manufacturing and Technology, the agency partnered with NASA on the project.
City Manager Bill Cahill told city councilors that the development partners had asked that an agreement that was set to expire on Aug. 20 be extended to Oct. 1.
"They told us the project has turned out to be more complex than they had originally expected," Cahill said.
The development team last week failed to meet a deadline for a letter of intent spelling out the terms of their purchase offer for the four buildings, totaling 812,000 square feet, and 130 acres of land at Agilent.
But they submitted a four-paragraph letter on Tuesday that announced their intent to buy it.
"We will submit a formal proposal with more detailed terms by Oct. 1, 2011," said the letter signed by United Properties president Frank Dutke.
The letter also says that the deal is "conditioned upon a clarification of the City of Loveland's long-term role in the park and the extent of its financial support for the proposed redevelopment."
The city's obligation to pay operating expenses of the Agilent campus, estimated at about $90,000 monthly, made the request for an extension hard for councilor Hugh McKean to swallow.
"There haven't been any deadlines met at any time in this process by CAMT," McKean said. "You can miss deadlines, but when we`re writing checks for the extra time you need, I have a problem."
Cahill said city negotiators urged the development team "to strive to produce as much as they can by the original date."
The Aerospace Clean Energy Manufacturing and Innovation Park proposes to accommodate as many as 100 companies employing up to 7,000 people working on manufacturing projects based on patents controlled by NASA and the Golden-based National Renewable Energy Laboratory.