As he heads into the May primary, Mayor Nutter is touting his success at bringing jobs to Philadelphia, including an announcement expected Wednesday that Urban Outfitters Inc. will add 1,000 jobs at the Navy Yard over the next three years.
The expansion was expected, as Urban Outfitters, with help from the Philadelphia Industrial Development Corp. (PIDC), has spent many months assembling parcels at the Navy Yard and ironing out terms to own, lease, or potentially own up to 11 buildings there.
The apparel retailer, whose headquarters are in Philadelphia, had for some time occupied five buildings at the Navy Yard. Nutter's announcement would mark the completion of the company's efforts to secure rights to six more, bringing the total to 11.
The company currently employs about 1,500 people at the Navy Yard, said David Ziel, who oversees store and headquarters construction and development projects for the retailer. Urban Outfitters sells products nationally and overseas under brands including Urban Outfitters, Anthropologie, Free People, and Terrain.
Ziel said he hoped renovation and construction on two of the newly acquired buildings would be completed by early 2012. The two new buildings would be largely intended to make room for the growing online operations of Anthropologie and Urban Outfitters, Ziel said.
Meanwhile, Nutter is expected to announce Tuesday that a Philadelphia company that had been considering moving will stay in the city, said administration sources who asked not to be identified. The company also may add jobs here over the long run, sources said.
It's all part of what the administration is calling "jobs week."
Nutter is not expected to face a major opponent in the May primary, but he still must campaign and persuade voters to vote for him.
Tuesday, the mayor will attend a groundbreaking at 600 N. Broad St., the address of 98 new loft apartments, two new restaurants from Marc Vetri and Stephen Starr, and a ballroom and catering facility to be run by Joe Volpe, on the site of the former Wilkie Buick/Subaru.
Developer Eric Blumenfeld said the development, which he expects to complete in September, will complement another Vetri restaurant, Osteria, and help revive North Broad between Fairmount and Spring Garden Streets.
Already, he said, apartments he developed nearby at 640 N. Broad St. "have not a single vacancy."
Blumenfeld said the city had helped make the new project happen.
"Mayor Nutter has really made it part of his agenda that North Broad Street gets developed, and he's been incredibly supportive of everything that we've accomplished there," Blumenfeld said.
PIDC, a quasi-city agency, helped Blumenfeld get a $5 million loan for the $43 million project at 600 N. Broad St. from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, as well as federal tax credits.
"Without the help of PIDC, we wouldn't have been able to do it," Blumenfeld said.
Blumenfeld said 600 N. Broad St. would bring 150 permanent jobs and 200 temporary construction jobs. Vetri and partner Jeff Benjamin will open a gastropub focused on Italian beers. Starr's restaurant will be "a cross between a seaside Maine lobster shack and an upscale urban oyster bar," according to a company news release.
Vetri, whose Osteria, at 640 N. Broad St., has won plaudits from critics across the country, said he had a gut feeling that the area would boom when he opened that restaurant in 2007. Now, with the expansion of the Convention Center and additional housing in the nearby Fairmount neighborhood, North Broad Street should really hit its stride, Vetri said.
"It's the main artery of Philadelphia, so for me it's like that's the next hot spot," he said.
Alan Greenberger, Nutter's deputy mayor for economic development, said the city had worked hard to keep and add jobs here during and after the recession. In weekly meetings, PIDC and Nutter administration officials review about 60 projects, creating to-do lists.
In the last year, the city also has announced other expansions, including the development by Teva Pharmaceuticals of a $310 million distribution facility in Northeast Philadelphia, creating 375 jobs.
Nutter will discuss his jobs agenda at Thursday's Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce annual mayor's address.
Chamber president Rob Wonderling offered cautious praise for the mayor's work so far.
"We applaud the mayor's efforts to attract new business to the city and look forward to hearing his plans for the future as we move toward economic recovery," Wonderling said. He added that he wanted to see the city lower both business-privilege and wage taxes.
Mark McDonald, a spokesman for Nutter, said the administration was continuing to lower wage taxes and was working with City Council to change the business-privilege tax system.
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