WATERVILLE — City councilors on Tuesday will consider selling an unfinished building on a scenic lot near Messalonskee Stream and setting a hearing to discuss a dilapidated apartment building on Gold Street.
The meeting will be at 7 p.m. in the council chambers on the third floor of The Center at 93 Main St. downtown. It will be preceded by an executive session at 6:45 p.m. to discuss real estate negotiations.
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The property next to Messalonskee Stream is at 12 Glidden St., off Cool Street. The city foreclosed on the property for nonpayment of taxes.
The council will consider selling it for $9,000 to Janet Converse Kanai. Proceeds from the sale, minus the $3,684 due in taxes and other fees, would be placed in the city’s capital improvement reserve account. The council must take three votes on the sale and may take one or two votes Tuesday.
Conditions of the sale include that no one live in the building until water and sewer are connected to the property and that the property be cleaned up within 30 days of signing the paperwork. If the building is used seasonally, only water and sewer need be hooked up; if it is used year-round, licensed contractors must do the work on the structure to make it habitable, according to the conditions.
Council Chairman Fred Stubbert, D-Ward 1, said Saturday that he has a lot of questions about the property and wants answers before making a decision.
“Is it in the shore land zone? Was it built legally?” he said. “There is no sewer or water to the property. It’s not actually on Glidden Street — it’s on a private driveway. If she (Kanai) bought it, she’d have to get permission from the owner of the driveway to use it. It was not built according to code. It’s pretty bad, actually. It was never finished, and a lot of stuff was never completed on it. There are still junk cars on the property. My feeling right along has been that we should tear it down and let the neighbors use it as a picnic area.”
The vacant Gold Street apartment building is on a lot just south of Summer Street and is adjacent to the former South End Arena lot, where years ago neighborhood residents ice skated in winter. City Manager Michael Roy said in May that ownership of the building changed several times.
Councilors on Tuesday will consider setting a hearing for 7 p.m., Tuesday, Oct. 7 in the council chambers to decide whether the building is unsafe, unstable, unsanitary and constitutes a fire hazard. Officials also will decide if it is unsuitable or improper for occupancy, whether it is a hazard to health or safety because of inadequate maintenance, dilapidation, obsolescence or abandonment, or is otherwise dangerous to life or property. If councilors decide that is the case, then they would consider how to dispose of the property.
The resolution councilors will consider Tuesday, says it appears “preliminarily, the building located at 26 Gold St. in Waterville is dangerous or a nuisance.”
Stubbert said Saturday that the city’s facilities committee, of which he is chairman, met a couple of weeks ago and discussed the Gold Street building.
“The council has to make the ultimate decision but we (facilities committee) have a recommendation, and the recommendation is to tear it down,” Stubbert said.
He said signs have been posted at the building, and its doors boarded up, but children manage to get into it nonetheless.
In other matters Tuesday, the council will consider vacating part of Moody Street, which is a proposed, but as yet unaccepted way. The section being considered for vacancy is about 50 feet long and 50 feet wide and is at the north end of Moody Street, where it intersects with Webber Street.
The council also will consider amending the zoning ordinance to allow some substandard back-to-back lots with common ownership to be split.
The council will consider taking final votes to accept a $145,000 grant from the state Department of Economic and Community Development, to be used to provide technical assistance funds to area council of government agencies; and a $100,000 DECD public service grant to be used by the Maine Manufacturing Extension Partnership.
Amy Calder — 861-9247
Twitter: @AmyCalder17
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