Senior Center re-opening:
On October 26th at 11am we will be having a grand re-opening of the Senior Center located at 294 Pleasant Street. Through the use of Community Development Block Grant funds, the City has been able to revamp the interior of this building, formerly the Polish American Citizens Club, into a properly planned out Senior Center.
Previous work on the building included the addition of an elevator to make the building handicap accessible. This latest round of work included making the restrooms on each floor handicap accessible, realigning corridors and hallways, construction of offices and the construction of appropriate Senior Center spaces for various activities. This work was supposed to have been completed a little earlier, but due to sound project management we were able to expand the project to include the replacement of the floor in the lower level. This floor was broken, peeling and sometimes experienced minor flooding.
Come and join us for the ribbon cutting and tour the refurbished facility.
Goodnow Building:
By now I’m sure you are aware of the redevelopment of the former Goodnow Pearson Department store on Main Street in downtown. This has been an arduously long project, but congratulations to developer Gary Lorden for seeing this project through to a successful conclusion.
Not only are there 27 new luxury apartments for rent in the downtown, but the three commercial storefronts are available for tenancy and a new public Laundromat is open on the backside of the building. This is the largest private development to take place in the downtown in decades. I’ve had the opportunity to tour the building throughout its construction phases and most recently at the Open House. The apartments are beautiful and the continued vibrancy of downtown Gardner has never shone more brightly.
West Lynde Street (south) parking lot:
You may have read recently about the parking lot behind the Goodnow building being closed off to the public. I’d like to explain the whole story to you.
In March of 2009 I sent a letter to the City Council asking them to declare this property surplus to the City’s needs in order to allow me to do two things; In the short term I wanted to seek to lease the parking lot in order to facilitate the development of residential units within the downtown and in the long term seek proposals for an office building that may be built on the property. The Council voted to approve this request.
Since that time, we have discovered that we do not necessarily need to go through a formal leasing process, but rather we can license the use of the property. What is the difference? Basically a lease agreement is for a set amount of time and a licensing agreement can be terminated at will for any reason. The town of Stoughton, which is where we first heard of this being used, along with other municipalities have done similar arrangements to assist private development. The licensing agreement gives the City more flexibility than a lease agreement while achieving the same purpose (a restrictive use of the parking lot to help spur development).
The upside to the City is that we will receive “rent” for the parking lot as well as defer all maintenance costs to the licensee. This means the cost of snow removal, sweeping, and any other maintenance costs are paid for by the licensee. So far, the developer has spent approximately $20,000 in improvements to this lot (sealing, striping, fencing and irrigation).
I believe that it is in the best long-term best interest of the City to have this building put back to an appropriate re-use. If there is something the City can do to help promote this re-use, I believe we should do it. It is for these reasons I believe the licensing agreement of this parking lot works for everyone.
Thanks for reading.
Mark Hawke
Mayor, City of Gardner
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