Gary Granger’s $400 million proposal for Lansing has council member ‘cautiously pessimistic’

Gary Granger is proposing one of the most ambitious plans for Lansing, a year after his last downtown project fizzled out.

He recently told the Lansing State Journal about his new $400 million vision for downtown Lansing in a story published on Oct. 1.

Spanning four properties in the heart of downtown, the projects amount to one of the most ambitious plans for Lansing since the New Vision Lansing proposal was floated in 2023. 

The new Granger vision would build on the former Walter Neller property and renovate One Michigan Avenue (to be renamed Granger Place) and it would convert two downtown buildings he does not yet own, the former Kostichek’s building and the long-vacant YMCA building, into high-end housing, according to the newspaper article.

A month later, there are no more details.

Scott Bean, a spokesperson for the mayor’s office, said he reached out to planning, economic development, building and other departments after reading the Lansing State Journal article but the city has not been contacted about any of the projects Granger described.

The Granger Group agreed to give City Pulse basic information about their proposed projects, the same information that was in the State Journal but they did not and then they stopped responding to phone and email messages.

An executive left a message for a City Pulse reporter on Oct. 27, as the paper was going to press. The executive did not return City Pulse’s phone call.

City Council President Peter Spadafore told City Pulse he is cautiously optimistic about the new Granger plan, which would bring more life to that part of Washington Square. He said he would love to see the project come to fruition.

Spadafore said he had a brief phone call about the project but didn’t know details beyond what was in the newspaper and that official paperwork had not been filed with the city.

Council member Ryan Kost told City Pulse he “normally would be cautiously optimistic about a project like this but this time I’m cautiously pessimistic.”

The last Gary Granger pitch

The last time The Granger Group proposed a major project was in summer 2025, when Gary Granger held a sledgehammer during a press conference in front of poster-sized renderings of a design for the former Walter Neller property.

It was to be a five-story, 76-unit apartment building.

The renderings they showed off were not done for the Granger project; they were copy-pasted from a September 2023 Downtown Lansing Inc. marketing effort.

And not being able to show an actual design for their building wasn’t the only problem with the 2025 Granger Group plan.

They had sent out media invitations for the demolition ceremony a week before the event.

But they didn’t turn in the demolition permit paperwork until that Friday, less than a business day before the planned Monday, June 2 ceremony.

Lansing city staff were called in on the weekend and finished the permit shortly after noon on June 2, but that was too late.

By that time, the crowds were gathered and the catering tables were starting to empty.

An excavator, without a demo permit, sat quietly sidelined.

Gary Granger picked up and swung a sledgehammer at the building instead, noting that it would be torn down for real later.

A few days later, when the permits were ready, the excavator driver made a curious decision as live video cameras caught the demolition.

The excavator began on a wall that included a large mural of a young woman with the words “You have a voice.”

The machine’s metal jaws skipped over the unpainted brick and started the job by punching directly into the mouth of the painted young woman.

The symbolism was bigger than the pile of Neller bricks that would later be hauled away.

What’s happened since then?

It’s been almost 17 months since the first Neller announcement and if you look at the intersection between the two sites today, the 2025 Granger plan of beating the New Vision Grand Tower to market seems almost laughable.

The skyscraper is racing ahead, nearing its full height, and is hoisting politicians above the current skyline for construction tours while the Neller property is growing tall weeds. 

But Granger is back with more than a strong pitch this time.

One of the four components of his new plan is One Michigan Avenue, a 157,000-square-foot office building near the tower and the Neller property.

It was recently purchased by The Granger Group, a tangible and immediate part of the proposal.

Granger declined to tell the State Journal what he paid for the building, but according to public records, it was sold to his company at the beginning of September for $5.6 million, or about $35 per square foot. The building was last sold in 2017 for $16.4 million.

Gary Granger is CEO of The Granger Group, a Wyoming, Michigan-based company, and he got his start with his family’s separate Granger Construction, a Lansing business, and branched off in the 1990s. Granger Waste Services was an offshoot of the construction business and started in the 1960s.

The Granger Group built the House of Representatives building and the Michigan State Police building in Lansing and the company also takes credit on its website for a Lansing City Hall project that never materialized.

Growing weeds

Kost said he’s had to call city code officials because the vacant Neller site was growing knee-high weeds after it was leveled.

Kost said Gary Granger has a history of promoting developments in Lansing and often the plans don’t materialize.

Granger was one of two bidders to build or create a new city hall for Lansing, in a drawn-out process that has spanned mayoral administrations and many years.

When construction finally became a real possibility in 2024 – thanks to $40 million in state funds – Granger objected.

Ultimately, the city’s initial plan of moving into the too-large former Masonic Temple building and renting space to the Lansing School District was rejected. 

In its place, the city commissioned a new city hall from The Boji Group, the other bidder. That city hall is expected to open by the end of November, a few blocks from the Neller property and the New Vision skyscraper.

Kost said he had taken Granger’s side in the city hall dispute but later learned that a bidding email the company said they never received had been opened more than two dozen times.

“The entire city hall conversation, they had said they had not received the original bid and I took them at face value,” Kost said. “It’s tough with that track record.”

Kost said The Granger Group has done significant construction work in Lansing, including the House of Representatives building and the timing is right for investments in the city.

“We’re in a sweet spot; our downtown is where Grand Rapids was 20 years ago and we’ll turn that corner,” he said. “That Washington block is almost a lost block; there’s not a whole lot happening and if he starts it there, it would be an exciting opportunity.”

But Kost said he is more cautious about the Granger plan than he is with the average development, which typically has him cautiously optimistic due all the challenges.

“We would love to see this happen.” Kost said, “but I have a hard time now because of the Neller experience.”