CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Developer Scott Wolstein hopes to break ground within 30 to 60 days for a trio of riverfront restaurants at the Flats East Bank project.

On Thursday morning, the Port of Cleveland’s board of directors approved plans to issue up to $15 million in bonds to support the $17.5 million downtown Cleveland deal.

During a presentation to the board, Wolstein identified the tenants as the Hampton Social, a Chicago-based restaurant that will include a basement speakeasy and live-music lounge called the Bassment; a two-story nightclub-and-diner concept helmed by local operators including chef Dante Boccuzzi; and an Asian-fusion club and eatery dreamed up by the proprietor of XO Prime Steaks in the Warehouse District.

Wolstein described the restaurants, which will sit between Alley Cat Oyster Bar and FWD Day and Nightclub, as a small but important addition to the roughly $500 million waterfront development. In three new buildings, they’ll fill the last remaining gap near the water’s edge, bellying up to the riverfront boardwalk.

“Originally, we were thinking of building condominiums on that piece of ground,” Wolstein said of the grassy patch of land. “But I think there are other parts of the project where that will work better, and this land is just too valuable for restaurants.”

If his timeline holds, the businesses could open before the end of summer - high season for the Flats.

Third-phase plans for the Flats East Bank project also include an apartment building called Kenect Cleveland, with co-working, a high-end movie theater, restaurants and retail space downstairs. That building, a more complicated undertaking than the waterfront eateries, will be financed separately and will take longer to construct.

It will take longer to finance and build the second, and much larger, portion of phase three, an apartment building Wolstein is planning through a joint venture with Akara Partners of Chicago. Designs for that building, called Kenect Cleveland, show 300-plus apartments, a high-end movie theater, co-working facilities and retail spaces that could house restaurants or service businesses, such as hair salons or spas.

Wolstein expects to present that project to the port’s board early next year.

The port has issued bonds for previous phases of the Flats East Bank, which includes an office tower, an Aloft hotel and a waterfront apartment building lined with street-level restaurants and entertainment venues. The 23-acre site has ample room for more development. Wolstein told port board members that if demand for apartments stays strong, he believes there’s space for 1,500 additional units in the neighborhood.

Under the restaurant deal approved Thursday, the port will issue taxable lease revenue bonds, playing the middle man in the transaction and collecting a projected fee of $62,500. The Cleveland International Fund, a private-equity fund, will buy the bonds.

That arrangement marks a new approach for the Cleveland International Fund, which historically has lent money amassed from overseas investors seeking U.S. residency through a federal immigrant-investor visa program. Limits on visas and the contentious politics of immigration have dampened the flow of money from China into eligible projects, making it tougher to recruit new investors. So the Cleveland fund is shifting focus, concentrating on smaller projects in need of loans of $5 million to $15 million, and amassing most of the money from repeat investors instead of new ones.

For the Flats restaurants, the fund expects to draw 80 percent of the cash from past investors in such immigrant-investor, or EB-5, deals. Those investors include people who already have received green cards through the program, and have gotten or will soon get their money back from previous deals in the Flats or other Cleveland-area projects, and people who are still in line for green cards and therefore need to keep their cash deployed to meet federal government requirements.

“We’re looking to do more projects of this size and scale ... projects that banks might not be as interested in,” said Steve Strnisha, the fund’s chief executive officer. “This works nicely and fits well with us because the Flats investors we’re approaching know about the Flats and know about Scott. And all of our investors know about Cleveland."