CINCINNATI — The Hamilton County Board of Commissioners agreed Tuesday to buy the former Mercy Health building in Bond Hill.
With this purchase, the county will begin transitioning thousands of employees to the new office space in the coming months.
The sale cost $95 million, and Mercy Health will pay $30 million of that price tag. The rest is expected to come from the sale of county buildings that currently house a variety of offices, which will be consolidated into the new building.
Offices that will be consolidated include Job and Family Services, Developmental Disabilities Services, Hamilton County Public Health and the Veteran Service Commission.
The Alms and Doepke building, which houses JFS, will be one of the buildings going up for sale.
"We have been getting calls for years about the Alms and Doepke building," said Hamilton County Commissioner Denise Driehaus. "Developers approach every now and again and say 'hey is that building for sale?,' the answer in the past has been no."
With the board's approval Tuesday, Driehaus expects that building will be redeveloped.
"I expect we'll get a lot of interest in it, and convert it into residential," Driehaus said.
Last year, some downtown businesses voiced concern about county employees moving out of downtown.
"We really depend on, especially city and county workers for business here," said Chris Breden, owner of Arnold's Bar & Grill. "Obviously pre-pandemic, we were much busier for lunch."
Going forward, Breden has a sense of optimism around what may replace the JFS offices.
"I don't know if they're going to be working downtown because we're trying to get the lunch business, but I'm happy if more people are downtown no matter what," he said.
