Fort Mac agrees to buyout of former lead developer Macauley

ATLANTA — The Fort McPherson redevelopment authority has approved a $3.5 million buyout of its former lead developer, putting an end to a more than two-year relationship that soured last year.

The board of the McPherson Implementing Local Redevelopment Authority approved the deal late last month with developer Stephen Macauley after months of talks. Terms were made public Thursday as part of board discussion of the authority’s audit.

The board voted in October to negotiate a buyout of Macauley after months of acrimony.

Macauley signed his development agreement in May 2017. Under that pact, Macauley and partners would develop about 2,500 residences, offices, shops, lodging, restaurants and a performing arts center under a long-term lease of the land. But relations between Macauley and the authority, also known as Fort Mac LRA, grew strained. In February, Macauley and Fort Mac LRA appeared to be on the cusp of a new development deal, but the relationship devolved into allegations by each side that the other was in default.

Fort Mac closed in 2011, delivering an economic wallop to neighborhoods already ravaged by the foreclosure crisis and the Great Recession. In 2015, Fort Mac LRA acquired the 488-acre site from the Army and sold 330 acres to filmmaker Tyler Perry, who has since developed a sprawling movie studio.

About 145 acres were retained for future development, but the authority has made little progress other than a $17 million sale in August of a former command building to Easterly Government Properties for a future U.S. Food and Drug Administration facility.

The authority, meanwhile, is seeking a new developer and a new executive director.

In a news release, the authority said it “appreciates Macauley and its team’s commitment to excellence and their more than two years of working with the community.”

This article written by J. Scott Trubey with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

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