The contractors of campus apartment building Burnham 310 said they will not continue development work with the city of Champaign.

Burnham 310, which is being contracted by Pickus Companies, is one stage of a four-part development called Burnham Project, which proposes to unite Campustown and downtown Champaign, said Tom Bruno, city Councilman at-large.

The Pickus Companies developed the first two parts of this project, blocks A and B, which include Burnham 310 and County Market. The next two parts, blocks C and D, were originally planned to be completed by the Pickus Companies.

“We were arguing among ourselves about whether we should continue with them and they solved that problem themselves by saying, ‘That’s okay, we’re done in Champaign. We’re not going to submit proposals for blocks C and D,'” Bruno said.

Jeff Pickus of Pickus Companies said the company’s decision to stop doing work with both the Burnham Project and the city of Champaign was because of the economic downturn and issues with completing the project on time.

In a Champaign City Council meeting on April 21, the city discussed the future of the Burnham Project. Several council members expressed concern that the developers were behind schedule.

Though Burnham 310 was supposed to be completed by Aug. 15, 2008, the building recently received a permit for full occupancy this year on April 23, according to Pickus and Burnham 310 management. Champaign’s Building Safety Division could not be reached by press time. Currently, six of the 18 floors are being occupied, Bruno said.

Before the 2008-09 academic year, students who planned to live in the Burnham 310 building did not know until late July that the building would not be completed by the beginning of the school year.

One student, Brittany Black, senior in LAS, signed a lease to live in the building before this academic year. She said she was not notified about its incomplete status until a week and a half before move-in.

Black said she was given three choices of places to sign a temporary lease, but at the end of that temporary lease, she was forced to continually sign an additional extended one-month lease every month of this academic year.

Esther Patt, coordinator of the University Tenant Union, said other students who did not break leases with Burnham 310 also signed temporary leases with one of three alternative housing options.

The building’s property manager Theresa Kamerer said students were welcome to break their leases to live elsewhere and get full refunds.

“Anyone who wanted to get out of their contract was able to get out of their contract,” Kamerer said. “About half the people who signed leases for this year said, ‘Give us our money back and we’ll go someplace else.’ We were more than happy to do that.”

Kamerer said all students were reimbursed before school began in August 2008. Patt said many students came to the Tenant Union to complain that they had not yet received their reimbursement for rent after deciding to live somewhere else.

“If they said they gave every student a reimbursement before or after they moved into Burnham 310, then they are not telling the truth,” Patt said. She added that although the building now has occupancy permits, she does not believe all will run smoothly with the building in the future.

“So far, they do not have a very good track record for doing business here in Champaign,” she said. “Given what they’ve done so far, I’m not very optimistic about next year at all.”