MONROE — The city has made purchase offers to buy the long-gone former Union Bank branch and the chiropractor’s building behind it with an eye on creating a large public plaza at Blakeley and Main streets.
The city is currently in the due diligence phase on the properties, and nothing is final yet. If successful, though, the site would include public bathrooms and be repurposed to be used for community events.
The city first conceived of having a downtown plaza in the 1970s, and renewed its property search in 2015, city administrator Deborah Knight said.
This opportunity fell in the city’s lap when the adjoining properties both came on the real estate market in the past year. Combined, the block is almost half an acre large.
“How often do you get to have a corner lot?” Knight said.
Mayor Geoffrey Thomas is hopeful.
“The city and community have long wanted to establish a festival lot or park space in our downtown for some time,” Thomas said. “I’m really happy about this opportunity and look forward to working with our council, staff and community to make the active space we’ve been looking for.”
The property offer price for the Union Bank building was $1.1 million as of late August.
The property offer price for the chiropractor office property was $500,000 when the council signed off in June.
The city would use its parks development account for the land buys. In the short-term, it would allow downtown to have a public bathroom.
Knight said the long-term design will be developed with community input if the city is successful in buying the properties.
U.S. Bank now owns Union Bank, and had completed its purchase of Union Bank in December 2022. U.S. Bank already had a Monroe branch at U.S. 2 and Lewis Street which it vastly renovated in 2022. Prior to Union Bank, the bank site’s history was being one of the 50 branches of Frontier Bank, which was based in Everett. Federal regulators shut Frontier Bank down in 2010 and Union Bank assumed the assets.
