Richmond Heights City Council voted 6-0 Tuesday to approve an agreement authorizing taxable development revenue bonds for two more apartment buildings at the sprawling Belle Oaks development, even as crews race to finish the project's first units in time for tenants expected in early November. The vote covers buildings six and seven, along with a batch of related property improvements, at the site of the former Richmond Town Square mall.
Bonds Target Buildings Six and Seven
The agreement, reported by Cleveland.com, puts Richmond Heights, the Cleveland-Cuyahoga County Port Authority and the Belle Oaks New Community Authority into a shared financing arrangement. The bonds will cover public and some private improvements at buildings six and seven, as well as work on part of the Belle Oaks Meijer store property and outparcels along Wilson Mills Road, according to the same report. Council member Cherita Shaw was absent for the vote, per that account.
This marks the second round of bond legislation for the project. The first batch, approved by council in April 2026, financed the initial three apartment buildings now under construction, the news outlet reports. Buildings four and five, meanwhile, have not yet come before council, even though DealPoint Merrill is finalizing private construction loans for those two buildings and anticipates seeking an additional tranche of tax-increment-financing bond funding, the station's report notes.
Construction Climbing on Multiple Fronts
Buildings one, two and three are going vertical, and so are six and seven, according to the Cleveland.com account of the council discussion. The first Belle Oaks apartment buildings are projected to open to tenants in early November, per that same reporting, while buildings six and seven are not expected to wrap up until the second half of 2027.
Separate reporting from the Cleveland Jewish News indicates the second apartment complex is expected to be ready for move-in by March 2027, with the last of the first seven buildings following by November 2027. Building three is set to stand out from the rest, with the development's only underground parking along with an outdoor swimming pool and other amenities, Cleveland.com reports.
A $500 Million Bet on the Old Mall Site
Belle Oaks, developed by DealPoint Merrill, is billed as a $500 million mixed-use project at the former Richmond Town Square mall property, according to Cleveland.com, with plans for seven apartment buildings totaling 798 units ranging from 790 to 1,450 square feet. Dennis Nevar, a lawyer for DealPoint Merrill, discussed the financing with council, the outlet reports.
Separately, the Port of Cleveland reported its board approved up to $20 million in special obligation revenue bonds for what it called Phase 1B of Belle Oaks, covering buildings four through seven and totaling 270 market-rate units. The port's account describes the finished project as including 798 market-rate units across 13 buildings, a different building count than the seven-building figure cited by Cleveland.com; neither figure is resolved here. Similarly, a NEOtrans report pegged the overall Belle Oaks redevelopment's value at $285 million, a figure that diverges from the $500 million valuation reported by Cleveland.com.
Earlier port financing shows the scale of individual buildings within the project. In December 2025, the port approved $25 million in bonds for a nearly 130,000-square-foot building with 84 market-rate apartments and about 8,700 square feet of ground-floor retail, according to the Port of Cleveland. That same approval included $30 million in bonds for a second, 178,000-square-foot building with 97 market-rate units, a clubhouse and amenity space, per the port. A separate blog post from neo-trans.blog reported that the first two residential buildings under construction include 116 units across roughly 168,000 square feet.
Overseeing the flow of tax-abated funds is the Belle Oaks New Community Authority, a partnership of municipal, private and developer representatives that Richmond Heights City Council formed in 2020, Cleveland.com reports. The authority includes three residents, according to that account.
Trebisky Road Drainage Grant Also Approved
In a separate but unanimous vote Tuesday, council approved a resolution to apply for a fiscal year 2027 grant from the Northeast Ohio Areawide Coordinating Agency to fund drainage and sidewalk improvements on Trebisky Road. The grant request totals $15,000, and the city would need to provide a matching $15,000 if NOACA approves it, Cleveland.com reports.
Rachel Gardiner explained the project to council, according to the outlet. The work would cover roughly 0.49 miles, or 2,562 linear feet, along the east side of Trebisky Road between Hillary Lane and Highland Road, per that reporting. Trebisky Road, which connects Highland Road and Monticello Boulevard, currently lacks a continuous sidewalk, and open drainage culverts along the route create a physical barrier to pedestrian travel, the news outlet notes.
The project would enclose those existing culverts and build a continuous sidewalk above the enclosed drainage system, addressing both the drainage constraint and the pedestrian gap, according to Cleveland.com. Swales along much of the road have long precluded sidewalks there, the outlet reports. The drainage work follows a separate water-main transmission project on Trebisky Road that closed the road to through traffic from December 2025 until August 2026.
