The St. Paul Downtown Alliance filled vacant retail space by setting up businesses with free six-month leases.

Alexandra Johnson was searching for a storefront to move her dog sporting equipment business, Jack and the Pack, out of her garage. The old Heartthrob Cafe space on the ground floor of downtown St. Paul’s Wells Fargo Place had been vacant for more than a decade.

All they needed was a matchmaker.

Enter the nonprofit St. Paul Downtown Alliance, which has been pairing small businesses with empty storefronts through its Grow Downtown program since 2022...

...“Even though we have this large building, we’re still considerably a small business,” said Lillie Rosen of Halverson and Blaiser Group, which manages the building. “Being able to work with other small businesses and help them out is a great benefit.”...

More than 20 years ago, developer John Wall, President of The Wall Companies, had a vision for turning a former industrial site in Minneapolis’ Prospect Park neighborhood into a home for cutting-edge businesses tapping into research coming out of the University of Minnesota.

The development team of St. Paul-based Pak Properties and Halvorson Blasier Group LTD has started construction of Marshall Avenue Flats, a 98-unit affordable housing project first proposed about four years ago.

The $33.5 million project will bring a mix of one-, two- and three-bedroom units to a development site at 1606 Marshall Ave., according to a project fact sheet. Included are five three-bedroom units for households at or below 30% of area median income, 29 total units at 50% AMI, and 64 units at 60% AMI.

With a major boost from the city of St. Paul and other partners, PAK Properties and the HBG Group are moving closer toward starting work on a new six-story, 98-unit affordable rental housing development at Marshall Avenue and Fry Street.

Local developer Johnny Opara is nearing construction on what he calls a “luxury affordable” apartment building that’s been long anticipated in Brooklyn Center.

JO Companies, led by Opara, is building Wangstad Commons on four city-owned parcels with an emphasis on creating high-quality living with affordable rents. The four-story, 54-unit apartment will be highly amenitized and include family-sized units.

Construction is underway on the Malcolm Station Apartments in Minneapolis, Minn., Big-D Midwest Construction’s latest housing project.

The seven-storey apartment building, part of a large-scale neighbourhood development by The Wall Companies, features 210 units and 6,878 square feet of retail space and will be a key piece of ongoing development in the city, converting a former industrial area into a modern, mixed-use centre of activity, indicates a release.