![]() Department store giant Walmart has announced the upcoming closing of several stores nationally due to a number of issues, including weak financial performances. Six stores, four based in the Midwest and one each in the South and Southwest, are scheduled to close within the next month. The Southwest store is located in Albuquerque at 301 San Mateo Boulevard. The closures come two months after Doug McMillon, chief executive officer of Walmart, remarked on the TV show Squawk Box that stores thefts in 2022 had reached a historic high. “If that’s not corrected over time, prices will be higher, and/or stores will close,” McMillon remarked. Despite reports to the contrary, the company has not yet officially said whether more stores are scheduled for closure in the near future. City officials in Milwaukee, where a long-standing Walmart is set to shut its doors during the first two weeks of March, have announced that an effort is already underway exploring “possible replacement options” for the store. Stores earlier closed by the chain have been repurposed into community centers, libraries, and storage facilities, among other uses. Notes the publication CCIM: “Since these properties are never designated as historic buildings, no special restrictions apply to modifications, and they don’t have to preserve facades.” Based in Bentonville, Arkansas, Walmart currently operates in excess of 10,500 stores internationally—up from 8,500 a decade ago. Despite the closing of the six Walmart stores, the company continues to embrace an aggressive growth strategy. Earlier this year it announced plans to open just over 30 of its Sam’s Club locations over the next several years. Walmart locations greatly vary in size, but on average come in at about 180,000 square feet. By Garry Boulard
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![]() Union craft workers in 2022 enjoyed an average 3.8% increase in wages, fringe benefits, and other employer payments, a new survey is reporting. That figure is up from the 2.8% recorded in 2020, but still significantly lower than a 4.6% highpoint reached just at the edge of the Great Recession in 2008. The Washington-based Construction Labor Research Council report says that of the nine regions it surveyed, wages last year showed the greatest gains in the Northwest with an increase of 5.2%. Gains were smaller in the West North Central region, which logged a 3.2% jump. Other sections of the country, including the Mountain Northern Plains, Southwest Pacific, and Southeast, all saw increases in excess of 3%. The most modest gains were recorded in the glazier category at 2.5%, while teamsters saw the biggest increase at 4.4%. Further down the list: operating engineers, cement masons, millwrights, and carpenters, all with increases at or above the 4% level. According to Construction Labor Research Council figures, the actual monetary gain has improved from well under $1 in 2011 to $2.33 last year. By Garry Boulard ![]() Plans are now underway for the renovation of a much-used Pueblo, Colorado high school stadium. Located at 1001 West Abriendo Avenue, the 12,500-seat Dutch Clark Stadium was completed in 1950 and has seen some incremental upgrades over the decades. Now officials with the Pueblo School District 60 hope to see the launching of a $5.2 million renovation to be done in two phases. The project, taken on in a partnership with the Pueblo Urban Renewal Authority, will see the first phase construction of a retaining wall, rebuilding of the stadium’s stairs, entryway improvements, and installation of sidewalks around the facility’s parking lots, among other endeavors. It is expected that all of the projects related to phase one will cost around $3.4 million. Second phase work, estimated at $1.8 million, is expected to include upgrades to the facility’s locker rooms, press box, and restrooms. Funding for the project will come in part from the Pueblo Urban Renewal Authority. If all goes well, work on the stadium may be completed by the fall 2024 semester. Formerly called the Pueblo Public School Stadium, the facility in 1980 was named in honor of Pueblo native, coach, and National Football League Hall of Fame player Earl “Dutch” Clark. By Garry Boulard Spaceport America’s complex is envisioning an addition to its existing facilities.
A request for design services proposal was released Thursday from the New Mexico Spaceport Authority for a 30,000 square foot multi-purpose building. According to the proposal, the three-story addition will house the Spaceport’s core IT server center, staff offices, conference rooms, a virtual experience center, an auditorium and viewing areas. “The new building will provide modern, comfortable work and meeting spaces for NMSA staff and a means to receive, entertain and educate groups of visitors and/or potential customers,” states the proposal. Completion of the project is scheduled for November of 2024, based on the proposed schedule for what is being named the Spaceport Technology and Reception Center. NMSA will also be preferentially seeking out a New Mexico/Native American and or a resident veteran team through a design-build method of construction. Proposals for the project will be due by March 16th, 2023. The new building will be located west of the currently existing, one-eye shaped, structure which sits on 110,147 square feet of land. Situated in the desert basin east of Truth or Consequences, the original facility’s entrance resembles a pupil receiving an eastbound beam of light funneling into an optic nerve. A façade on the terminal building’s west end captures the arriving and departing spacecraft as if being processed in the occipital lobe of the design’s brain. In 2014 the completed building was engineered by Foster + Partners, in collaboration with URS Corporation and SMPC Architects. The Spaceport’s design was awarded for excellence by both the American Institute of Architects and the National Association of Industrial and Office Properties. Norman Foster, founder of the global architectural firm Foster + Partners, was appointed to Advocate of the Forum to the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe’s Forum of Mayors in January, according to the UNECE's website. A decade ago, the global firm announced in a press release that it was consulting with the European Space Agency to explore constructing lunar housing with 3D printers. According to the agency’s website,” Foster + Partners devised a weight-bearing ‘catenary’ dome design with a cellular structured wall to shield against micrometeoroids and space radiation, incorporating a pressurized inflatable to shelter astronauts.” Back on earth the Houston Spaceport is seeking a contractor to complete a $150 million project focused on consumer retention by 2024 and includes: “the development of the entire site, introducing retail, hotels, education expansion, and infrastructure such as roads,” reported ABC News on January 31st. By Dane Vaughn ![]() A large industrial building site bordering downtown Albuquerque is on the market for $3.8 million. The site, which includes 56,000 square feet of building space, is the former home to Creamland Dairies Incorporated. The company was founded in 1938, producing, by the late 1980s, up to 1.4 million gallons of milk monthly, and 2.5 million gallons of ice cream annually. The company ceased its operations at the Broadway site in 2005, and now has production facilities at 10 Indian School Road NW. The property is a visible landmark to tens of thousands of passing drivers with its exterior facing Broadway and Coal painted to look like a 19th century warehouse, while a corner of the property at Coal and Arno Street SE resembles an ice cream store. The property, which includes some 20,000 square feet of subzero freezer space, and 12,000 square feet of dry storage space, among other features, is being listed by Commercial First Realty of Albuquerque. By Garry Boulard ![]() Even as fewer homes are being sold due to a rise in interest rates, the availability of new homes remains at a historic low. So said Christopher Hebert, the managing director of the Harvard Center for Housing Studies, in an appearance before the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs. Noting that home prices substantially increased in 2021, Hebert said everything changed last year when the Federal Reserve upped interest rates. Result: “By the end of 2022 home price gains year-over-year were down to 8%, with monthly trends showing prices actually following.” Housing starts also took a dive, primarily in the single-family segment, plunging by around 30%, “ending the year at a pace close to the pre-pandemic level of around 900,000 new homes, once again below the long-term average.” And even though home buying greatly declined last year, “the number of homes on the market has stayed near historic lows,” said Hebert. In responding to these trends, Hebert told lawmakers that there is a “clear need for concerted efforts by the public, private, and non-profit sectors to pursue both regulatory reform and more efficient means of production to increase the supply of housing, and particularly of modest cost homes.” More specifically, Hebert attacked what he called the “multiple barriers to added supply” mentioning in particular the need to move away from “restrictive zoning codes and approval processes.” He pointed to the “efficient means of building homes through off-site production, and growth of the labor force” as two other tools that should be used to address the crunch. By Garry Boulard ![]() An important step forward has been taken with a project that is expected to see the construction of a 500,000 square foot microelectronic manufacturing campus on the northwest side of Colorado Springs. The Billerica, Massachusetts-based Entegris announced several months ago that it wants to build its facilities on just under 90 acres of land at 301 S. Rockrimmon Boulevard. The project will expand a presence that Entegris already has in the city: the company was founded more than two decades ago via the merger of the manufacturing companies Flouroware and Empak, which operated a 70,000 square foot facility in Colorado Springs. It is thought that it may cost as much as $631 million to build the new Entegris campus. Members of the El Paso County Board of County Commissioners have given their unanimous approval to providing some $9.2 million in incremental tax revenue for the project. That revenue will be spread out over a 25-year period. Various public officials, including Colorado Governor Jared Polis, have also expressed support for the project. As earlier announced, the project is also receiving around $115 million in various incentives from the Colorado Springs Chamber of Commerce and Economic Development Corporation, Colorado Springs Utilities, and several other entities. The proposed facility upon completion would, according to Entegris, be known as a “manufacturing center of excellence.” According to a company press release, the new facility will support Entegis’ advanced materials handling and microcontamination control divisions. Both of those divisions are tasked with developing products used to manufacture semiconductors. Company officials have said that the campus will most likely be built in phases, with the first phase seeing the construction of some 100,000 square feet. Work is expected to begin later this year, with an anticipated first phase completion date of summer 2024. By Garry Boulard ![]() A bill is now under consideration in the New Mexico State Legislature that would provide funding for flood mitigation projects in a state that has often been plagued with flash flooding. As introduced by Senator Siah Correa Hemphill, the Acequia Fund for Disaster Response will appropriate anywhere from $2.5 million to $5 million annually to fund such projects as acequias irrigation work, dams, reservoirs, and diversions. Hemphill was among local officials last summer who toured the devastation from rising Gila River flood waters in the community of Gila and western Grant County. “I want to create a rural infrastructure crisis fund at the state government level,” Hemphill remarked to the Silver City Daily Press in explaining her legislation. “This is a fund we could draw from to have easier access to funds in a crisis.” According to an analysis of the bill compiled by the Legislative Finance Committee, the measure would “double the funding available for acequias and community ditches.” If passed, the bill would also allow monies from the existing Acequia and Community Ditch Infrastructure Fund to go to “disaster response recovery, and hazard mitigation, and for matching and meeting funding available from other state and federal programs.” The measure is now on its way to the Senate Conservation Committee for review. By Garry Boulard National Association of Home Builders' Alicia Huey Challenges Latest Federal Waterways Rule2/9/2023 ![]() The Biden Administration’s decision to pursue an updated and expansive Waters of the United States policy could have a detrimental impact on new home construction. So said Alicia Huey, the chairperson of the National Association of Home Builders, in testimony before the House’s Water Resources and Environment Subcommittee. Huey remarked that the new rule is “so extreme that the federal government will have the authority to regulate certain roadside ditches, isolated ponds, and channels that may only flow after a heavy rainfall.” The WOTUS rule was repealed by the Trump Administration in 2019 and replaced with a ruling that decreased federal protection of certain streams and wetlands, while also doing away with the requirement that landowners must secure the approval of the Environmental Protection Agency before taking on any new construction projects near water bodies on their own property. Last month the Biden Administration issued a new WOTUS ruling, expanding the definition of wetlands and waterways. Michael Regan, EPA Administration, said the new WOTUS definition is designed to “safeguard our nation’s waters, strengthen economic opportunity, and protect people’s health, while providing greater certainty for farmers, ranchers, and landowners.” But in her testimony, Huey maintained that the latest WOTUS rule “fails to provide the clarity and certainty the home building industry seeks.” Continued Huey: “This rule will increase federal regulatory power over private property and lead to increased litigation, permit requirements, and lengthy delays for any business trying to comply.” Huey additionally asserted that the updated WOTUS “will not significantly improve water quality because much of the rule improperly encompasses water features already regulated at the state level.” The fate of the WOTUS rule could be impacted by an upcoming Supreme Court decision in the case of Sackett V. EPA. That case centers on two Idaho landowners challenging the jurisdiction of the EPA under the WOTUS rule. By Garry Boulard ![]() A two-day auction is scheduled to begin on February 27 on a busy commercial property just outside Phoenix. Located on a nearly 5-acre site at 4730 E. Lone Mountain Road in the small town of Cave Creek, some 30 miles to the north of downtown Phoenix, the Lone Mountain Landing measures around 34,700 square feet. Built in 2003, the retail center is the home to a restaurant, fitness center, nail salon, and pet grooming store, among other businesses. Hosted by the Phoenix real estate offices of Kidder Matthews, the auction for the sprawling property will begin with a starting bid of $1.8 million. Cave Creek has seen a modest population growth in recent decades, jumping from around 2,900 people in the 1990s to some 5,000 today. By Garry Boulard |
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