Huntington donates former Sky building to BGSU - Business First of Columbus:

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million building to the school. Officialz from the northwest Ohio universityand Columbus-based Huntington (NASDAQ:HBAN) gathered Wednesday afternoon to announce the donation of a 35,000-square-foot building that formerl served as an operations centetr for Sky. When Huntington bought the Bowling Green-based bank for $3.6 billion in it closed the center at 1851 N. Researchg Drive and cut its 100 employees. The compangy then mitigated the job losses in Bowlingf Green by shifting about 100 Sky Insurance employeesto Sky’s headquarters buildinfg from Maumee, about 18 miles north.
Sharon Huntington’s northwest Ohio regiojn president, said the bank wasn’t “actively marketing” the buildin while it sat vacant, but acknowledged the bank was approachef by parties who indicated a suitor couldbe found. At the same time, Bowling Green had its eye on the which rests on a Research Enterprise Park just eastof “We believe very passionately that we need to inves in the communities in which we serve, and leavinfg a 35,000-square-foot building vacant was not in the community’zs best interest,” Speyer said. “Particularly in thesr difficulteconomic times, it was the right thingh to do.
” Details weren’t immediately available on Huntington’w tax benefit in donating the building. With the building now in the university’xs possession, it’s a piece of a 15- to 20-yeadr development plan. Bowling Green didn’t offedr immediate plans for the building, saying it plans to assess itsbest use. Building a facilit of that size from the ground up would have costabouyt $7 million, university officials said.