Mall could lead to settlement

Long dispute over hospital might be resolved as Pabst Farms development seeks Aurora land

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, June 20, 2006

By AMY RINARD
arinard@journalsentinel.com

Oconomowoc - An announcement last week of a large open-air shopping mall proposed for Pabst Farms makes it all the more likely a settlement will be reached between Aurora Health Care and the city to build a new hospital in the Town of Summit, Town Chairman Len Susa said Monday.

Such a settlement has been rumored for weeks, but Thursday's announcement of a 1 million-square-foot mall planned by General Growth Properties Inc. at the northeast corner of I-94 and Highway 67 would appear to assume a resolution will be reached. That's because the 110-acre retail project will require 43.5 acres controlled by Aurora where the health care system wants to build a hospital.

"There has to be a settlement of some kind for both of these things to happen," Susa said of the mall and hospital projects.

"I am waiting with bated breath for someone to call me."

It would be possible for Oconomowoc to use its expanded zoning powers permitted under state law to approve the necessary rezoning and land-use change needed to build a hospital at the Summit site, which also is part of the Pabst Farms development.

Susa said the announcement of the shopping mall project seemed to anticipate such a scenario.

The Town Board approved the zoning and land-use changes, but construction of a hospital on the site was blocked in April 2005 when the Waukesha County Board refused to give its required endorsement. Rezoning the town site and land-use change actions by the city would not need county approval.

Oconomowoc Mayor Maury Sullivan and Aurora spokesman Jeff Squire each acknowledged that both sides are talking about ways to resolve the lawsuit filed against the city by Aurora in 2001 after the Common Council rezoned the city site so a hospital could not be built there. After that vote, Aurora turned its attention to the Summit site.

Aurora revived its application to build its 88-bed, $166 million hospital in the city late last month after a court ruling on a motion in the case declared the rezoning illegal and zoning of the Aurora site reverted to its original zoning designation. The city is appealing that ruling.

Neither Sullivan nor Squire would discuss the status of settlement talks between the two parties in the ongoing litigation.

"We have long wanted to put this whole issue behind us," Squire said Monday. "We just want to resolve it all, and we hope the city does, too."

He said Aurora officials would rather build a hospital on the Summit site, mostly because town officials have endorsed the plan.

"The Town of Summit site has been our preferred site," Squire said.

"But," he added, "the only path forward now is construction on the Oconomowoc site, so that is what we are pursuing."

Peter Paul Bell, president of Pabst Farms Development, acknowledged that he is assuming a settlement between Aurora and the city will be worked out and that the hospital will be built in Summit at the southeast corner of I-94 and Highway 67, where he has proposed a health and wellness campus complete with other medical offices and clinics.

"Hopefully, the parties in that suit will figure out a way to resolve this whole thing," he said Monday.

Bell said the shopping mall project proposed by the nation's largest and premier retail center operator is a "wonderful opportunity for Oconomowoc." He said General Growth typically develops projects of at least 95 acres - and all 110 acres of the proposal shopping mall site, including the land now controlled by Aurora, are envisioned for the Pabst Farms project.

"We really do need all 110 acres," Bell said. I doubt whether they'd consider doing it with less than that; all our emphasis now is on the 110 acres."

Sullivan said Monday that the proposed retail development is the kind of project the city wants to see in that section of Pabst Farms.

"We're excited by it," he said. "I think it will give a boost to Pabst Farms and a boost to the city."