$57 million Sun Plaza project under way

Brian Seals

Friday, June 12, 1998 | 11:06 a.m.

Workers this week started clearing the way for the Sun Plaza office building in downtown Las Vegas by razing a five-story structure on the site at 3rd Street and Lewis Avenue.

The demolition will facilitate ground-breaking, expected to come in August, for the 13-story, $57 million office plaza to be built in partnership between Nevada State Bank, American Nevada Corp. and the law firm Harrison, Kemp & Jones. Completion is expected during the third quarter of 1999.

Delays in the project had been attributed to relocating tenants at the site and redesign of utilities and other infrastructure.

But with work in progress, officials with the $57 million project are hailing it as part of a downtown Las Vegas revitalization trend.

"What makes this really exciting is what's happening in downtown Las Vegas," Rick Smith, vice president of office and industrial properties, said Wednesday in an address to the Commercial Marketing Group. "Las Vegas is now developing a central business district."

Sun Plaza joins other projects in progress downtown -- a new $96 million federal courthouse and an $84 million regional justice center.

"Sun Plaza will bring Class A offices to the downtown market for the first time in nearly two decades," Nevada State Bank President George Hofmann said in a statement. "With downtown revitalization shifting into high gear, it answers the need for excellent accommodations in a prime location within a business core."

Besides housing Nevada State Bank, the 283,000-square-foot Sun Plaza will be the home of the Las Vegas Sun and its sister publications. The Sun and American Nevada Corp. are controlled by the Greenspun family.

The Harrison, Kemp and Jones law firm will be another partner in the venture and a major tenant, having signed a 10-year lease for 16,000 square feet in the building.

About 50 percent of the building is pre-leased, Smith said.

"There's a lot of people who doubted this project two years ago, including me," Smith said. "Now, this project is very much a reality."

Also this week, American Nevada hired Douglas Abell as senior project manager for Sun Plaza. Abell will coordinate the work of architects, engineers, general contractors and the leasing staff.

Abell, a 25-year development industry veteran, most recently was with Property Company of America in Tulsa, Okla.

While American Nevada is involved in developing Sun Plaza, it is also staying busy at is core operation in Green Valley. Though most of the residential space at the 8,400-acre master plan community is at capacity, construction of commercial space continues.

About 70,000 total square feet of office space is under construction in the form of a two-story, 30,000-square-foot building and a two-story building of 40,000 square feet. Completion is expected in the fall on the buildings that will front Green Valley Parkway. Also, Phase II of the company's Technology Park near its Corporate Center was recently completed and is about 60 percent leased.

New office space in Green Valley coincides with a trend of more commercial space in suburban areas -- while at the same time there is rejuvenated interest in downtown. These two seemingly opposing trends aren't mutually exclusive, according to Smith.

Growth in commercial space in suburban areas can be attributed to master-planned communities like Green Valley and Summerlin.

"Anytime you have substantial master-planned communities where thousands of people live, it only follows you'll have significant commercial development," Smith said.

At the same time, Las Vegas' and Clark County's steps to keep government and legal hubs downtown naturally create a need for office space. "That's why you see downtown development at the same time we're seeing suburban office space," Smith said.

Meanwhile, a 600-room hotel-casino planned in Henderson at Green Valley Parkway and I-215 by American Nevada is in the concept-design stage, Smith said. He said a recent moratorium by the city of Henderson on small casinos won't effect those plans.