A concept plan for an international food village aims to make Brooklyn Center a global food destination. The ambitious new project is led by James Sanigular, owner of International Food Corporation, which supplies global foods to retailers like Cub and Hy-Vee.

The main part of the project would convert the former Brooklyn Center Target store into a 110,000 square foot ethnic food market and grocery store.

“We kind of describe it as Midtown Global Market meets Costco, where it would provide opportunities for food from around the world, but also really a destination in that it would also provide opportunity in bulk,” Meg McMahan explained, the Brooklyn Center community. Director of development.

According to city officials, Sanigular is also interested in buying a nearby strip mall that could be turned into housing, a health clinic and an African brewery.

McMahan stressed that the proposal is very preliminary.

“They’re testing a lot of different things to see what’s going to work on the site,” McMahan said. “What it might look like six months from now may not be exactly the mix of uses we envision today.”

Brooklyn Center City Council recently approved a preliminary development agreement with Sanigular’s company. The deal would give the company exclusive negotiating rights for a year to find the financing needed to buy the Target site, which the city owns. The city does not own the nearby strip mall. The developer should enter into a separate agreement in order to purchase this site.

The project, as proposed, would be considerably larger than the Midtown Global Market in Minneapolis, a 58,000 square foot market. McMahan says the Brooklyn Center concept could be between 100,000 and 140,000 square feet.

If the plan comes to fruition, the project would be a central part of the city’s so-called “Opportunity Site” master plan.

South of the Target site, the city had previously received plans from a separate developer to build about 750 units at the corner of Shingle Creek Parkway and Bass Lake Road. The environmental review of this project is nearing completion. The city council could give land use approvals for this project this summer.

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