Cotton Mill group now open to investors

December 9, 2010

By KELLY DANIELS
citybeat@bellsouth.net

The Cotton Mill Development Group LLC began marketing itself to investors last week, representatives said Wednesday.
Mark Boutwell, managing director of PDK Capital Advisors in Atlanta, Ga., reported that the sale will close at the end of December.
Boutwell spoke to the Starkville Mayor Parker Wiseman and the Board of Aldermen during a special meeting Wednesday afternoon, updating them on progress of the project after over a year of uncertainty due to the nation’s unsteady economy.
“Fortunately, we’re so close now we can taste it,” Boutwell said.
PDK has partnered with Mark Nicholas, owner of Nicholas Properties in Ridgeland, to spearhead development of the Cotton Mill Marketplace on property fronted by Highway 12 to the east and south, Russell Street to the north and Spring Street to the west.
Plans for the large-scale, “village environment” include a 150-room hotel, restaurants, offices, a conference center, a four-story parking deck and retail space.
“It’ll be word-class,” Nicholas said.
The Cotton Mill Development Group will also renovate Mississippi State University’s historic E.E. Cooley Building, leading to a three-month holdup from the U.S. National Park Service, Nicholas reported, explaining he had to get congressional intervention.
Funding for the project will operate with several moving parts, including funds from a Community Development Block Grant and the Economic Development Highway Grant Program and tax increment financing from the City of Starkville.
The project will cost more than $64 million.