Displaced by the casino, the partnership will move to 1240 Huron Road. Positively Cleveland will take 17,500 square feet at the western corner of East Fourth Street and Euclid Avenue.
The Greater Cleveland Partnership and COSE will move their offices into the first four floors of a building at 1240 Huron Road. Liggett Stashower, which currently fills the first three floors of the building, will move elsewhere in PlayhouseSquare.Displaced by the planned casino, Greater Cleveland's chamber of commerce and its visitors bureau are betting their chips on other downtown locations.
The Greater Cleveland Partnership plans to move its offices from Public Square to PlayhouseSquare.
And Positively Cleveland, the area's convention and visitors bureau, will move to the corner of East Fourth Street and Euclid Avenue.
The nonprofit groups were thrown into limbo last year, when Rock Ventures signaled plans to put a temporary casino in the Higbee Building. Thursday, Rock Ventures and Caesars Entertainment Corp. announced they will build a $350 million first phase of their casino on four floors of the former department store, which is part of Tower City Center. The Cleveland Horseshoe Casino could open in early 2012.
To make way for the project, the Greater Cleveland Partnership and the Council of Smaller Enterprises, a small-business group, will move their offices and 100 employees from the second floor of the Higbee Building to PlayhouseSquare. By late spring or early summer, the business groups will occupy 50,000 square feet in a five-story building at 1240 Huron Road.
"We've enjoyed being on Public Square, and we're looking forward to being in the PlayhouseSquare district," Joe Roman, the partnership's president and chief executive officer, said in a written statement. "I believe our small and large members will enjoy - and take advantage of - our new location."
The 1240 Huron building was renovated just two years ago for Liggett Stashower, a communications firm that leased the first three floors and christened the property the LS Brand Building. Now Liggett Stashower is moving again - to the fourth floor of the Hanna Building on Euclid Avenue. The firm expects to relocate by the end of this month.
Steve Veres, the firm's managing partner and chief operating officer, said Liggett Stashower planned to stay in its space much longer. But the company was willing to make way for the partnership and the casino.
"All the parties have invested their heart and soul into this deal to make it work," he said.
Revamping space for the partnership and COSE will cost about $3.2 million, said Yvette Ittu, the chamber's executive vice president of finance and operations. She declined to elaborate on Rock Ventures' role in the deal.
Initially, the partnership tried to amass several nonprofit organizations to move together. Roman still hopes to find other nonprofits to fill 20,000 square feet of unclaimed space in the new building. But several organizations, including Positively Cleveland, decided to move their offices elsewhere or to stay put.
Positively Cleveland, which subleases from the partnership on the first floor of the Higbee Building, chose the western corner of East Fourth Street and Euclid Avenue. The visitors bureau and the Greater Cleveland Sports Commission will occupy 17,500 square feet on two floors.
"It's an exciting development and a great location for a visitors bureau. It's the hub of all the visitors right now," said Terry Coyne, a Grubb & Ellis broker who represented Positively Cleveland in the deal.
The first-floor space, which recently housed an exhibit of preserved human bodies, will be renovated for a visitors' center. About 1,800 square feet at the corner will be used for an unidentified Cleveland-centric store or restaurant. Positively Cleveland and the sports commission, which started operating under combined leadership Jan. 1, will tuck their offices and conference rooms behind the visitors' center and onto the second floor.
Developer Ari Maron, whose family brought residents and restaurateurs to East Fourth, said the renovations will cost about $1.7 million. The project will eliminate four of 52 upper-floor apartments. Construction could end in May.
"We really could not have picked a better spot," said David Gilbert, president of the visitors' bureau and the sports commission. "We're going to have a highly visible, ground-floor presence in a thriving area."