MORENCI — A long-vacant building in downtown Morenci is about to get a new lease on life.
A grant from the state of Michigan’s Revitalization and Placemaking program has been awarded to help rehabilitate and renovate the former hardware store at 148 W. Main St.
Local accountant Brent Shea, who recently merged Shea & Associates Advisory and Accounting with Ohio-based BHM CPA Group, plans to move his offices into the ground floor and put two apartments on the upper floor. The business is currently across the street at 133 W. Main St. Shea, who bought the practice from Phil Rubley, said the company has been in that location since it started nearly 50 years ago.
He had been looking for a new space, and the former hardware store offered a chance to both give the growing business more room and make a major improvement to downtown Morenci. He noted that because the L-shaped building has frontage on both Main Street and North Street, its condition affects the look of two streets instead of one.
Shea credited the state’s Revitalization and Placemaking program with making the project feasible by covering $464,100 of the roughly $1.3 million cost.
“The thing about old buildings is they cost more to fix than they’re worth when they’re done,” he said.
Without grant funding, he said, many old buildings in downtowns would just fall apart.
The project also promises to add two dwellings, helping to address the area’s housing shortage.
The second floor is currently split between one apartment that’s been vacant for several years and a space that previously held the hardware store’s paint shop, Shea said.
“They’re in rough shape right now,” he noted of those spaces.
After the renovations are complete, he said, there will be a one-bedroom, one-bathroom unit with a study that covers about 1,000 square feet, and a two-bedroom, two-bathroom unit with a study that has about 1,500 square feet.
City administrator Jeff Bell said the state “helped fill a critical financing gap, making this project possible.”
“This redevelopment supports the expansion of a long-standing Morenci business, helping retain and grow jobs while bringing new life to a prominent downtown building,” Bell said. “Transforming a long-vacant property at a key intersection strengthens our downtown core and shows how targeted state investment can make a meaningful difference in small, rural communities.”