Author: BEX Staff

The planned 45KSF Pinal County Elections and Early Voting Building took a step forward recently when the Board of Supervisors approved a budget amendment totaling more than $32M for the project’s design and construction. Funding comes from a variety of sources, including the County General Fund ($19M-plus), the American Rescue Plan Act ($10M) and federal Local Assistance and Tribal Consistency monies ($3M). In addition to housing the County Elections Department, the building will also have space for early voting and voter registration. (Source)

By Roland Murphy for AZBEX Depending on their orientation, attendees of this week’s BEX Leading Market Series panel on Healthcare could have heard pragmatic optimism or optimistic pragmatism. Speaking to a standing-room-only crowd at SkySong, the panel was made up of: Mark Barkenbush, VP at Banner Health, Steve Eiss, VP of Construction and Real Estate for Northern Arizona Healthcare, Russ Korcuska, Senior VP of Construction & Special Projects for Phoenix Children’s Hospital, and Edward Willard, Director of Business Development and Strategic Planning at Dignity Health. The group was moderated by Kitchell VP of Preconstruction Julie Garcia. The Current Projects Garcia…

By BEX Staff for AZBEX HSL Properties has bought a nearly 51-acre site entitled for 378 Build-to-Rent lots at the SWC of Tangerine and Thornydale roads in Marana. Seller H2T Partners LLC had previously requested a rezoning from Residential to Specific Plan for the property, along with a Marana General Land Use Plan amendment from Commercial to Master Plan Area. The Marana Town Council approved the request last September. The $9.45M sale was managed by Kit Donley with Donley Commercial Real Estate. HSL is known for developing luxury apartment communities and has multiple projects under its Encantada brand around the…

By The National Center for Construction Education & Research In anticipation of Women in Construction Week, the National Center for Construction Education & Research conducted interviews with 176 tradeswomen and analyzed 770 responses to a survey directed to women in the industry. The results have been compiled into a white paper, “In Her Own Words: Improving Project Outcomes,” which will assist employers with recruiting, hiring and retaining women in craft positions. NCCER’s goal was to go beyond the numbers and statistics that are typically presented in research about women in construction. The white paper highlights the unique benefits women bring…

By Associated Builders and Contractors The construction industry reported 248,000 job openings in January, according to an Associated Builders and Contractors analysis of data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey. JOLTS defines a job opening as any unfilled position for which an employer is actively recruiting. Industry job openings fell sharply last month, down 240,000 on a monthly basis and 148,000 from the same time last year. “Today’s construction job openings number was simply shocking,” said ABC Chief Economist Anirban Basu. “While the total number of job openings economywide stood at a lofty…

Groundbreakings 1. Interstate Warehousing recently broke ground on the 273KSF Phase I refrigerated warehouse component of its planned 92-acre development in Kingman. Master site planning is in place for up to 1.2MSF, depending on eventual customer needs. Interstate Warehousing’s sister firm Tippmann Construction is handling the design and construction, and Phase I is expected to be complete and operational by the end of the year.  2. Phelan Development recently broke ground on its Pecos Center I industrial project near Phoenix-Mesa Gateway Airport. The development features three buildings of 224.6KSF, 108.6KSF and 141.1KSF, each with between 1.5KSF and 3KSF of office…

By BEX Staff for AZBEX Diversified Partners has announced a $100M investment in a portfolio of commercial real estate projects on the west side of Glendale. Projects affected by the announcement include the Cambria Hotel, the En Fuego retail development, the North 91st Ave. and Cardinals Way retail development and the North 75th Ave. and West Bethany Home Road commercial space. The new developments total more than 25 acres of commercial property and all are near major West Valley attractions like Westgate, Desert Diamond Casino, State Farm (Cardinals) Stadium, the Entertainment District and the Loop 101. While most of the…

By Roland Murphy for AZBEX Mayo Clinic is continuing its quest to fulfill a master planned biotechnology and innovation hub known as Discovery Oasis on 228 acres around its Mayo Clinic Hospital campus at 56th Street and Mayo Blvd. in north Phoenix. On Jan. 19, Mayo Clinic filed a Planned Unit Development request for Discovery Oasis Paradise Ridge, a 76-acre site that will include a “New medical focused campus that will include outpatient clinic, patient services and advanced R/D and medical equipment manufacturing space, with associated tenant amenities, to total up to 2.3MSF within the Mayo Clinic Discovery Oasis Master…

A set of zoning code changes to promote housing construction on infill sites is making its way through the Tucson City Council process. In June of last year, the Mayor and Council discussed issues they commonly heard concerning the City’s Planning and Development Services Department. After those discussions, Council ordered improvements to the Tucson Unified Development Code. Over the last nine months, a series of public outreach and interdepartmental communications led PDSD to create seven amendments to the zoning code that it will present this week. Among the recommended changes are: Requiring only one parking space per unit and eliminating…

By Roland Murphy for AZBEX After spending the second half of 2022 in limbo as LG Energy Solution paused to reevaluate its investment due to the current state of the market, events since the first of the year strongly indicate the company’s Queen Creek battery plant project will move forward. AZBEX was first to report on both the initial agreement between LGES, its subsidiary ES America LLC, the Town of Queen Creek and Pinal County to bring the project, with a total estimated valuation of $2.8B, to a 650-acre site at Germann Road and Ironwood Drive. We were also first…