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Cameron Kuhn: Still Mr. Big?
Orlando developer Cameron Kuhn remains shamelessly self-confident. But a backdrop of lawsuits, course changes and angry tenants suggests even he isn't immune from the troubled real estate market.
 Prized Possession Developer Cameron Kuhn has had his eye on Church Street Station since the early 1990s, when he first began rehabbing downtown Orlando properties. He landed his “dream property” this spring, when he bought it for $34 million at a bankruptcy auction. [Photo: Jeffrey Camp] |
Holding court in the glass-walled penthouse of The Plaza, the shiny, cylindrical office tower he’s finishing at Orange Avenue and Church Street, Cameron Kuhn looks every bit Orlando’s downtown giant.
Literally, because he is 6 feet 4 and upward of 300 pounds.
Figuratively, because he has rejuvenated 20 properties in this key part of downtown — an area other developers shunned when Kuhn began renovating buildings in the early 1990s.
From his 21st-floor suite in the $140-million Plaza, the largest revitalization project in Orlando’s history, the giant can survey his works at every turn: To the east, along Orange
Avenue, the old J.C. Penney building, now three stories of retail and office space with balconies. The glass-and-steel Mini Cooper building. The once-sagging Have a Nice Day Café, now trendy architectural office space.
And just across Orange from The Plaza is the project Kuhn has coveted since he first arrived in Orlando: Church Street Station, the three-block, historic-themed entertainment complex at the CSX railroad tracks and Interstate 4. Once the fourth-largest tourist destination in Florida, Church Street Station had fallen on hard times by the time Kuhn moved here from Chicago in 1991. In 2001, he told Florida Trend it was his dream property, the only “cool” buildings left to redevelop downtown. He tried to buy it but failed.
 "Today in this market, I’m the villain. But one year from now, I’ll be the hero." [Photo: Jeffrey Camp] |
This spring, however, Kuhn realized his dream, buying Church Street for $34 million at the bankruptcy auction that disposed of the assets of Lou Pearlman, the former Orlando music producer now jailed on federal charges related to a $317-million investment scheme.
Some considered Kuhn’s timing brilliant: The purchase coincided with construction of a new Church Street exit off I-4; a new arena planned nearby just north of the highway; a new performing arts center under way downtown, and a possible light-rail station coming right in on the tracks.
But a series of lawsuits, retreats and angry Plaza tenants suggests that even the giant isn’t immune to the upheavals in the residential real estate and credit markets that have withered many developers’ fortunes. Since buying Church Street in April, Kuhn has missed several large payments to investors; The Plaza’s general contractor and others have sued him; and he appears to be retreating on his most recent big vision — reinvigorating part of downtown Jacksonville’s business district.
Despite all that, Kuhn, 48, reveals no hint of concern — nothing, in fact, but an almost shameless confidence in himself and his projects. “Today in this market, I’m the villain,” says Kuhn, complaining that his high-profile projects bring him scrutiny that other developers don’t have to endure. “But one year from now, I’ll be the hero.”
