A rendering of the new Homeland Grocery store in NE Oklahoma City
NE 36th Street and N. Lincoln Blvd., Oklahoma City, OK 73105
Since 1993, community stakeholders and City Councilmembers have been trying to bring a full-service grocer to Northeast Oklahoma City, going so far as to create the NE Renaissance TIF District, and providing $4,400,000 in TIF financing to incentivize a developer to build a grocery store in the neighborhood.
In early 2020, a development partnership between The Alliance for Economic Development of Oklahoma City, Inc., Northeast Equity Group and TR Partners negotiated a long term lease with HAC, Inc. to bring a Homeland Food Store to NE 36th and N. Lincoln Blvd (the “Project”). The new full-service store will be in a unique position to provide healthy affordable alternatives to fast food, in a USDA Food Desert that currently has no full-service grocery store, and has seen 2 of its limited-service grocery stores close within the last 2 years.
The Project is expected to create 75 new full time jobs, earning competitive wages, a broad suite of benefits and the potential for ownership: HAC Inc. offers all full time employees a no cost participation in its Employee Stock Ownership Program (“ESOP”). The ESOP is set up as a retirement plan on the employees’ behalf, and after 3 years of service, the ESOP becomes 100% vested in the employees account.
The Homeland Grocery project at 36th and Lincoln is part of an overall master development plan that includes the City of Oklahoma City Senior Wellness Center, which will be operated in part by Langston University, the state of Oklahoma’s only Historically Black College and University. During the Wellness Center planning stage, a grocery store was identified as a critical co-anchor for the master plan.
In August, 2020, Crescent Growth Capital was engaged by the Homeland team to pursue a New Market Tax Credit (“NMTC”) financing to construct a new, 30,000 sf full-service grocery store, including a bakery, deli, and pharmacy with drive through. A total of $10.5M of NMTC allocation was provided by Heartland Renaissance Fund and US Bank, with US Bank also serving as the NMTC investor, providing an estimated $1.5M of NMTC net benefit for the project.