WHITEWATER — The City of Whitewater seeks to spur redevelopment of three parcels on the western side of Jefferson Street between North Main Street and East North Street. It could bring housing and businesses, including a grocery, to the edge of the city’s downtown after years of struggling to bring in a fresh food market.
Whitewater city officials say a building on the southwest corner of Jefferson and Main streets will be torn down by the end of April but a house on the north end of the block will stay put.
In all, the project includes three separate parcels now owned by the city’s community development authority.
“This could be retail. This could be restaurants. It could be upper floor housing and even condos,” Mason Becker, the city’s economic development director, said.
The city envisions a development with ground-floor commercial space, likely retail, service or office space.
The city-owned block is across the street from Cravath Lake, set alongside a residential neighborhood on the edge of downtown. It’s connected to the city trail system, and links to Mill Race Park, Brewery Hill Park, Whitewater Rotary Skate Park.
Whitewater has scuffled to land fresh grocery retail since Sentry Foods closed in 2015. For years, the city and an organization called the Whitewater Grocery Co-op worked toward bringing in a grocery store that would bring in an option other than the Main Street Walmart.
Through work with consultant Redevelopment Resources, a Madison-based economic advisory group, the city began to focus on a development that might offer more than just housing.
Redevelopment Resources in a study identified retail grocery as a “gap” in the city, even after an Aldi opened in Whitewater in 2024, Becker said.
The same study indicated a “need for approximately 175 new rental housing units and 75 owner-occupied condos/townhomes annually” in Whitewater.
The block-long lot sits within a tax increment district, which could allow the common council to approve tax dollars to offset costs for the redevelopment and “position it as a priority redevelopment opportunity aligned with the city’s broader downtown revitilazation strategy,” the city wrote in an April 1 media release about a request for proposals for the project.
The deadline for private proposals is April 30.