Lawrence approves tax breaks for Alarm.com downtown office project

Lawrence approved about $166,100 in public tax relief for Alarm.com, betting that a $2.5 million renovation at 714 Vermont St. will turn a former climbing gym into downtown office space for about 70 workers. The 5-0 vote gives the security and software company help now in exchange for a project city leaders say could keep a growing employer in the urban core.

The package includes an 80% Neighborhood Revitalization Area property tax rebate for 10 years and Industrial Revenue Bonds that exempt construction materials from sales tax. Alarm.com had asked for a 95% rebate over 15 years, but city staff recommended the smaller, shorter incentive, and commissioners followed that advice. Staff estimated the city’s share of the property-tax rebate at about $162,000 over the decade, with another $4,100 in forgone city sales tax tied to the bond-backed construction materials. No publicly described benchmark or clawback terms were attached to the vote.

Alarm.com said the project would create about 13,000 square feet of office space and accommodate roughly 40 employees already in Lawrence, plus about 30 more positions as the company grows. City filings said those new jobs would be concentrated in software engineering and carry average wages of about $146,000 a year. Company officials said the hiring could unfold over about two years, and some workers have already relocated to Lawrence from Minnesota, Denver and Austin, Texas.

The choice of 714 Vermont St. also matters. The building, which opened around 1948 as the University Ford sales building, is one of the few surviving downtown examples of that type, according to city documents. Climb Lawrence had occupied the site until closing in May. Bill Fleming, an attorney for Alarm.com, said the building also appeared in the 1962 film Carnival of Souls, a small but memorable piece of local history for a block now headed for office reuse.

Alarm.com first had a Lawrence presence in 2019, when it had three employees, and opened an office in 2021 above Sylas and Maddy’s Ice Cream at 11th and Massachusetts streets. The company initially sought incentives for the former Lawrence Journal-World printing plant at 630 Massachusetts St., but city staff said that site was not a suitable fit, and the company shifted to Vermont Street instead. Mayor Brad Finkeldei said downtown Lawrence lacks available class A office space, underscoring the scarcity that helped shape the decision. Susie Carson, the city’s economic-development director, said the incentive review was one step before a final determination on whether the deal benefits the city.