Harbor Shores Receives "Development of the Year" Award

Harbor Shores received the "Development of the Year" award for the West Side of the state on Wednesday, November 10th. The award was presented by Crain's Detroit Business and the Grand Rapids Business Journal during the University of Michigan/Urban Land Institute Real Estate Forum held in Flint, Michigan.

Harbor Shores Resorts Managing Director Mark Hesemann represented the development on a panel with the six other award winners. Hesemann, a member of the Urban Land Institute, said, "It is truly an honor to receive this recognition. The partners in Harbor Shores have worked tirelessly to get the project to where it is today. Recognition like this solidifies the efforts of so many to transform the communities of Benton Harbor and St. Joseph for years to come."

Harbor Shores Community Redevelopment, Inc. (HSCRI), is a non-profit entity, investing in the future of Southwest Michigan and building Harbor Shores, a beach and golf resort community in Benton Harbor and St. Joseph, Michigan. The purpose of Harbor Shores is to be a catalyst to support ongoing efforts of community transformation – defined by HSCRI as economic, environmental, and social/ cultural revitalization efforts. HSCRI is comprised of three non-profit organizations that have established relationships and a long history of contributions within the Benton Harbor community: Whirlpool Foundation, Cornerstone Alliance, and the Consortium for Community Development.

Harbor Shores is Lake Michigan’s first beach and golf resort community, located in St. Joseph and Benton Harbor, MI. The community’s central amenity is an 18-hole, public Jack Nicklaus Signature Golf Course that offers stunning views of Lake Michigan. The 530 acre master-planned resort plans to feature a full calendar of events and world-class amenities, including a marina village and riverwalk, restaurants and shops, deep-water marinas, a boutique hotel and spa, miles of recreational trails and rivers, and acres of parks and green space. Harbor Shores will be home to 750 residences, including charming cottages, custom homes, town homes and condominiums.

To date, over $80 million has been spent in land acquisition, pre-development costs, environmental remediation, golf course construction, infrastructure upgrades and professional service fees.

Harbor Shores Trustee and Cornerstone Alliance President Wendy Dant Chesser said, "This visionary and transformational development is a public-private partnership that is truly one of a kind in the country."

"Our organization, Cornerstone Alliance, is at the forefront of the economic development efforts, which includes job creation, increased local tax base as well as increased consumer spending. Accolades such as being named Development of the Year, truly aids our efforts to market the community and Harbor Shores to prospective investors, companies and potential homebuyers," added Chesser.

With a clear connection made between economic and community development, the goal of Harbor Shores is to be the catalyst to continue positive change in the Benton Harbor community.

Harbor Shores Trustee and President of the Consortium for Community Development Dr. Marcus Robinson said, “While many developers work to create jobs and remediate environmentally contaminated properties, Harbor Shores is unique in its goal of affecting individual attainment. Contractors are required to hire a portion of their employees from the economically distressed neighborhoods of the community and meet targets for doing business with small and minority businesses.”

Robinson noted, “The Consortium in turn works with community-based organizations to assist in job training and small businesses counseling to assist the contractors find qualified parties in meeting their obligations to assure the economic gains from the project help the residents of the area.”

“The impact does not stop there, as the project becomes financially viable and covers development costs, all net proceeds will be re-granted to the community in focus areas that include education, individual capacity building and the arts. The Harbor Shores Development is truly a holistic approach to sustainable development for the economy, the environment and for the residents of the area," added Robinson

Learn more about University of Michigan/Urban Land Institute Real Estate Forum.
Learn more about Whirlpool Foundation.
Learn more about Cornerstone Alliance.

Tremendous First Season

The Golf Club at Harbor Shores enjoyed a very successful season.  Who would have thought that we would receive so much national recognition in our first year? 

The official opening of The Golf Club at Harbor Shores on August 10, with “Four Legends”, Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer, Tom Watson and Johnny Miller at the Harbor Shores Champions for Change Golf Challenge brought the national spotlight to our corner of Southwest Michigan. An estimated 5,000 spectators watched from the course as these four players paired together for the first time in history, and countless thousands saw the replays of Nicklaus’s legendary 100-foot putt.

And countless more will see the half-hour special on this historic event that will air on Saturday, April 9^th, before the CBS telecast of the 2011 Masters Championship.

The event not only heralded the opening of the only Jack Nicklaus Signature Golf Course on the shores of Lake Michigan. Whirlpool Corporation donated $1,000,000 to benefit Benton Harbor’s Boys and Girls Club and the First Tee in the opening ceremony.

“The golf course has been many decades in the making in terms of transforming the industrial base in the community into something very productive,” said Jeff Fettig, CEO Whirlpool Corporation. “I can’t think of a better group of people, the four legends of golf, we had here today to kick it off.”  

The Golf Club at Harbor Shores gained national attention earlier in the year when the Senior PGA Championship selected the course as it’s home for 2012 and 2014.  Thousands of people will come into the community, and the tournaments be televised in 80 countries around the world.  These events will be another testament to how golf at Harbor Shores enables social and economic change.

As we close out the season, we have 80 Founders take advantage of the First Annual Founders Pass, and we ended the season with more than 11,000 rounds. Some of those rounds included notable celebrities such as Notre Dames Coach Kelly, retired Cubs player Ryne Sandberg, and the winner of the US Open Graeme Mc Dowell as well as PGA golf pros from all over the Midwest along with members from their Clubs. Yes, it was a grand opening season.

The golfing season is now over, and we begin to prepare for 2011.  Thank you to all who participated in the success of the first season of The Golf Club at Harbor Shores.