For immediate release - January 2007

(DALLAS) – A successful exchange of two office building complexes in south Dallas will ensure that more than 120 Dallas County Community College District employees can move to newly renovated, larger facilities in 2008. DCCCD, which supports growth in the south Dallas sector, exchanged the former two-story Sears processing center at 1300 Corinth St. for a four-story building located at 1601 S. Lamar St. — formerly part of the Sears & Roebuck complex. The exchange was facilitated by Matthews Southwest, developers of Southside on Lamar in the old Sears & Roebuck complex.

Members of the district’s board of trustees approved the property acquisition for 1601 S. Lamar St. in August 2006; DCCCD purchased the Corinth Street property in 2004.

“We are excited to conclude this exchange and move forward with our plans to consolidate and relocate district employees to a new, centralized building. DCCCD will be one of several neighbors in this increasingly popular area, South Side on Lamar, which has been reborn from old industrial space to new lofts and retail space developed by Matthews Southwest,” said Dr. Wright Lassiter, DCCCD’s chancellor.

The new DCCCD building — which includes adjoining buildings and totals 95,500 square feet of space, plus across-the-street parking for employees and visitors — occupies 2.66 acres; the exchange enabled the district to acquire a facility that was larger than the Sears processing center, which comprised 78,784 square feet on 2.2 acres of land. Constructed in 1921, the 1601 S. Lamar property will be renovated and updated beginning in 2007 so that district offices can move by the end of 2008 from 701 Elm St. to the Lamar Street facilities. The district anticipates spending approximately $7.2 million on building upgrades and improvements.

Use of the R.L. Thornton Jr. Building on Elm Street will be transferred to El Centro College, which needs additional space for faculty and administrative offices and conference rooms.  Plans also include moving the public meeting space for the DCCCD board of trustees from the Elm Street location to 1601 S. Lamar when renovations are complete.

“The new Lamar Street facilities are located in the rapidly developing commercial/residential Cedars area and offer ready access to DART light rail for our employees,” added Lassiter. “Within the next few months, an infrastructure improvement project sponsored by the city of Dallas and the North Central Texas Council of Governments will begin to transform the utility lines, sidewalks and streetscape into a pedestrian-friendly area with small, park-like seating areas, beautified walkways and enhanced lighting along the property extending from the Dallas Convention Center along Lamar Street to our newly-purchased location. We look forward to those changes and to our move.”

“We are extremely excited to have DCCCD join the growing list of commercial, residential, restaurant and entertainment projects in the South Side area, and we look forward to the opening of the district’s newly improved facilities in a grand 1920s building,” said Jack Matthews of Matthews Southwest.

In addition to DCCCD’s new facility, the South Side area is home to Gilley’s Dallas, Amuse Restaurant, Poor David’s Pub, Brooklyn’s Jazz, Standard and Pours, Absinthe and Texas Carribean Foods. The area also soon will welcome Bill’s Records and Tapes, plus The Beat condominiums.

For more information, contact Ed DesPlas, DCCCD’s vice chancellor for business affairs, at (972) 860-7552 or Matthews Southwest at (972) 221-1199.

Press contact: Ann Hatch, 214-860-2478