From the governor planning his next home in Baton Rouge after leaving the Governor’s Mansion to a lease deal for a new school to move into the former Redemptorist High campus, it was a big week in real estate.
As first reported by Daily Report, Gov. Bobby Jindal and his family will be moving to University Club when his term ends at the end of this year. A spokesman for the governor confirms Jindal is building a “family home” in the development, but did not provide additional details.
However, homebuilder Jackie Braud says she and her husband, Ted Braud, who own the residential construction company Traditions by Design, are building the custom home for Jindal, his wife, Supriya, and their three children. Braud says construction is currently under way on a vacant lot the Brauds previously acquired in the development’s eighth filing.
“It’s a beautiful large lot,” she says. “It’s near the golf course overlooking the lake with woods behind it so the children will have a wonderful area to play.”
Braud also confirms the house will be near that of LSU President F. King Alexander.
Also this week, Cristo Rey, a new Catholic high school that will partner with local businesses and serve students from low-income families, announced it will open in the fall of 2016 at the former site of Redemptorist High School.
Cristo Rey administrators say they secured a lease for the former Redemptorist campus at 4000 St. Gerard Ave. after conducting an extensive search for a location in downtown or central Baton Rouge.
After Redemptorist closed in May, the site became available for lease in early June at a rental rate of about $3 per square foot, or $23,853 per month.
The Baton Rouge school will bring to 32 the number of Cristo Rey schools across the country. Under the Cristo Rey model, students offset the price of tuition by working five days per month at a local business. In Baton Rouge, 40 businesses have committed to hiring teams of four students each for the 2016-17 school year. The school anticipates enrolling 125 students in its first class of ninth-grade students next year.
And after sitting on the market for six years, The Bluffs Golf Resort in St. Francisville is poised to change hands. Local attorneys Kenneth Carter and Richard “Jerry” Dodson are teaming up to acquire the property—a 182-acre golf course, clubhouse and an adjoining 118-tract of undeveloped land—from owner Claude Penn, who acquired the resort from its developer, Jim Tanner, in 2009. A tentative closing date is set for Sept. 4.
Though a purchase price has not been disclosed, a spokesman for Penn tells Daily Report the buyers are paying “far less” than the stated asking price for the development, which totaled $11.3 million. The golf course had an asking price of $6.5 million, the clubhouse was listed for $3 million, and the adjoining 118-acre tract was listed at $1.8 million.
“Our selling price is way less than half of that,” says Bobby Waters, Penn’s spokesman. “The asking price is not even close to the sale price. Mr. Penn is going to lose a lot of money on the deal.”
Here’s a rundown of some of the other top local stories making headlines in Daily Report this week:
Lane Regional Medical Center in Zachary has become the latest plaintiff in an antitrust case advancing in Alabama federal court, alleging Blue Cross and Blue Shield insurers are functioning as an illegal cartel. A complaint filed in Baton Rouge federal court late Friday does not name Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Louisiana as a defendant, but accuses 71 other companies of having “conspired with Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Louisiana,” and accuses BCBSLA of “overt acts in furtherance of those conspiracies in Louisiana” to reimburse health care providers at rates below competitive levels for services.
More than 12,000 frustrated motorists from 13 states responded to billboards along Interstate 10 earlier this year asking them to take an online survey about I-10 traffic congestion in Baton Rouge. Later this month, the results will be unveiled to the public at a series of meetings designed to gather even more feedback on suggestions for improving traffic along the I-10 corridor from La. 415 in West Baton Rouge to Essen Lane.
Louisiana’s transportation infrastructure is woefully inadequate to meet the needs of its citizens, and the state’s 20-cent gasoline tax doesn’t generate enough money to address the problem. That was the message delivered to the Press Club of Baton Rouge this week from the head of the Louisiana Good Roads and Transportation Association—a nonprofit organization that advocates for increased transportation spending—on the same day that, coincidentally, the Louisiana Legislative Auditor released a report saying essentially the same thing.
—Steve Sanoski
The post ‘Daily Report’ Week in Review: Jindal plans to build home in University Club, Cristo Rey to lease former Redemptorist campus, The Bluffs buyers score a deal on resort purchase and a whole lot more appeared first on Baton Rouge Business Report.