Historic Peoria Heights pump house will have a new tenant. Here's what we know
Peoria Heights and Bradley University have finally agreed to lease terms on the village's historic pump house building.
The village board approved a five-year lease with Bradley University's Turner Center for Entrepreneurship, which will use the facility as a shared commercial kitchen, at its meeting Tuesday night.
Peoria Heights chose Bradley's commercial kitchen plan over a proposal from the owners of Pour Bros. and Slow Hand BBQ, who had sought to turn the building into a cafe.
Bradley's plan for the pump house is part of an effort to foster a place where food entrepreneurs can get their businesses off the ground in an environment that reduces barriers for starting a business.
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"We remain excited about this opportunity," said Jim Foley, the director of the Turner Center for Entrepreneurship. "Since this became public that Bradley wanted to make a proposal to use the pump house, we've gotten a lot of feedback from the community that there is a need for this type of shared commercial kitchen."
Wayne Aldrich, the community development director for Peoria Heights, said the village is "really happy" with the lease agreement for the village-owned building.
"We're excited about this use. We've been talking to the folks at the Turner Center for quite some time now and knew that they were interested in a location in Peoria Heights, and the pump house just turned up at the right time and they were certainly interested in it," Aldrich said.
Online ordering and pickup of food is central to the commercial kitchen model.
"I feel really good about the direction we're headed; the Heights have been really great to work with," Foley said.
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Foley said the next big step for the project is getting the pump house fitted from a retail space into a commercial kitchen. He said they hope to be operational by early to mid-summer but the timeline could change.
One of the chief concerns from neighbors of the pump house was activity at the space at night and in the evening. Foley said Bradley heard these concerns and will do what it can to limit how much the space is used at night.
"One thing that became clear through the process is that we want to be very respectful of the neighborhood," Foley said.
Bradley is partnering with Connie Randall, who owned local catering company A Matter of Taste until its closure in January, to run the project. Randall operated her catering company for over 40 years. Her role would be to mentor and support entrepreneurs in the space.
The pump house, which dates back to 1934, was formerly managed by Kim Blickenstaff's KDB Group, which at one point had an agreement with the village for the space.
However, the relationship between KDB Group and the village soured, and the agreement between the two was eventually terminated. The pump house was brought back into village control in 2023.
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This article originally appeared on Journal Star: Peoria Heights pump house has new lease for tenant
