Residential, grocery store in plans for DeSoto Square mall redevelopment

The scene outside DeSoto Square mall on Wednesday afternoon is part of the reason the place badly needs redevelopment, said Jerrell Davis, president of Madison Properties Southeast.

Three Manatee County Sheriff’s Office cars surrounded part of the northern wing of the mall in response to a call made by mall security. Patrol deputy Jay Rodriguez said a man was acting strangely and on drugs. Rodriguez said the man would be taken to a hospital.

Davis is determined to see DeSoto Square, 303 301 Blvd. W., overcome the stigma of a mall flanked by cop cars. In discussions with the Manatee County Sheriff, Davis said he’s been told that the mall is a “total safe place.”

According to data provided by the Manatee County Sheriff’s Office, it responded to more than 2,300 calls for service at DeSoto Square mall during the past three years, including for shoplifting, larceny and trespassing.

On Wednesday, Davis offered a different impression of DeSoto Square’s crime situation.

“There have been no incidents here at the mall whatsoever in years,” he said. “That’s what they tell me.”

He noted one shoplifting incident in the past year of which he’d been informed. Davis, who lives in Orlando, visits the mall site several times a month.

The calls for service to DeSoto Square increased every year since 2014, with 844 calls to the mall last year.

He has ambitious plans to renew the mall’s reputation. Davis hopes a residential tower, a grocery store and a national movie theater chain, which will show first-release films, will bring shoppers back to the mall.

People have asked Davis why he doesn’t bulldoze the mall and start over, he said. But to him, the mall is a structurally sound building with plenty of unrealized potential.

“We’re not chasing money,” he said. “We’re the opposite of the previous owners.”

Madison Properties is in charge of the redevelopment at the behest of Brooklyn-based owner Meyer Lebovits, who bought the mall for $25.5 million at the end of February.

The former Macy’s anchor spot in the mall is a potential spot for housing, Davis said. Macy’s, which occupied the largest anchor spot in DeSoto Square, left the mall in 2014 to open a store in The Mall at University Town Center, which opened in October that year. Davis said it’s likely anchors such as Macy’s won’t return to DeSoto Square.

He envisions the housing as affordable for the Bradenton community, but he was clear that it won’t meet the definition of what most people think of when they hear the words “affordable housing.”

“This isn’t government housing,” he said. “It’s just going to be affordable based on the community we’re building this for.”

Anai Marines, 19, lives in Ellenton but drives to DeSoto Square because she said the clothing selection there is better for her than at Ellenton Premium Outlets, which is closer to her home. If the residential part of DeSoto Square came to fruition, Marines said she’d like to live there. If she does, she’d like to see more kid-friendly activities added to the mall.

“Like a little playground for the kids,” Marines said. “And more things for the kids to be here.”

The first steps in the mall’s redevelopment include upgrading parking lot lighting, which has already begun. Parking lot paving and a fresh coat of paint on the exterior are next. Davis estimates the full redevelopment plan will solidify more during the next six to nine months as the infrastructure work progresses.

“The past is the past,” Davis said. “And we learn from the past but we are not the past. We are strictly focused on the future.”

This story was originally published May 24, 2017 at 5:12 PM with the headline "Residential, grocery store in plans for DeSoto Square mall redevelopment."