The Sebring Community Redevelopment Agency has a new program with the goal of adding more retail businesses downtown after the CRA helped bring more eateries into the area.
After the CRA Board workshopped the details of a commercial rental sublease program the board approved it recently at its regular meeting.
CRA Board Chair David Leidel explained the rental assistance plan is mirrored after what the CRA has done with the buildings it has purchased.
The CRA would go to a landlord and offer to sign a lease with them with the option for the CRA to sublease it to potential tenants, he said. It would go through a similar disposition process where the CRA would advertise for proposals then conduct interviews to find viable and appropriate businesses for those locations.
“We would go ahead and select them and lease them the property, particularly for the same amount we are paying for it,” Leidel said. “We are just getting CRA control over what tenants are going in and for how long.”