The former Boys & Girls Club building, shown Thursday in Waterville, has become the focus of discussion lately as the city recently won a $12,000 settlement in a codes violation lawsuit against its owner. Rich Abrahamson/Morning Sentinel

WATERVILLE — A large, dilapidated, long-vacant building off Main Street has become the focus of discussion lately as the city recently won a $12,000 settlement in a codes violation lawsuit against its owner.

The former Boys & Girls Club building in Waterville is seen Thursday. Rich Abrahamson/Morning Sentinel

Many say the former Waterville Boys & Girls Club building at 6 Main Place, originally built in 1930 as Colby College’s Alumnae Building, should be torn down and turned into a needed parking lot.

Vacant nearly 30 years, the brick building stands between Main Street and College Avenue, surrounded by businesses, apartment buildings and professional offices that draw a lot of traffic and pedestrians, including those who visit the adjacent Waterville Area Soup Kitchen.

Over recent years, police, fire and code enforcement officials have responded to the building for various issues including people getting inside and trying to live in it, with some doing drugs and leaving needles and other debris strewn around. Someone also set fire inside in 2022.

The building is owned by an LLC, whose name keeps changing and the owners of which are hard to identify. Dan Bradstreet, director of the city’s code enforcement office, said the city deals with the LLC through the LLC’s attorney. The city took the then-owner, 6 Main Place Venture LLC, to court because of violations of its property maintenance ordinance as the owners refused to pay for repairs the city was forced to make.

Kennebec County Superior Court this month awarded the city $12,000. During court proceedings, 6 Main Place Venture LLC sold the property to Maine Oak LLC, according to the court judgement, which said that the name of the LLC changed but the owners remained the same.

Jeremy W. Dean of Portland is listed as the LLC’s attorney on the court paperwork, dated March 19 and April 10 and 16, 2025. His office was closed Monday, according to an email. A message left on his phone Monday afternoon was not immediately returned.

One of the repairs the city had to do was clean debris and board up a hidden alcove of the building where trash and needles had collected. Bradstreet said that since the lawsuit, the LLC has been responsive when the city contacts it about any issues there. There is a lien on the property now, he said.

The former Boys & Girls Club building is seen Thursday in Waterville. Rich Abrahamson/Morning Sentinel

Former Mayor Karen Heck raised the issue of the building at a council meeting April 15, saying it has been the source of great expense to the city and is unsafe.

Heck said Monday that the property is an embarrassment and she questions the owners’ motives in keeping it in the first place.

“It’s a building with a lot of history — good history — that is now being abandoned basically by people who have hidden their identities while they try to make a ridiculous amount of money on a building that should be torn down,” Heck said.

She said it is a haven for people with addictions and she would rather see efforts being put into supporting people with addiction rather than arresting them.

“It’s just an unsafe place that is a testament to greed instead of a testament of what was for lifting people up and giving them a place to congregate,” she said.

Bradstreet told councilors it would be a “gigantic feat” for anyone to do something with the building, which is huge and needs a lot of work.

“That’s my white whale, that building,” he said. “I’d love to see something happen.”

City Manager Bryan Kaenrath said he believed the building is on the market for about $800,000. The Dunham Group, a real estate firm in Portland, is advertising the building online for $725,000, touting it as a redevelopment opportunity eligible for historic tax credits. The ad says a preliminary architectural survey indicates 40 residential units could be developed inside and it is “perfect for low income housing tax credits.”

The city’s assessor’s office lists the latest owner as Maine Oak LLC, with an address of 1 Cranberry Lane, Kennebunk, and the assessed value of the property for 2024-25 is $161,400.

The city’s tax collector’s office lists the owner as 6 Main Place Venture LLC. Tax Collector Linda Cote said Monday that the first quarter taxes totaling $807 have been paid. The second and third quarter taxes, for December and March, have not been paid, nor have the upcoming June taxes which all total $2,460.

Meanwhile, Carla Caron, who directs the Waterville Area Soup Kitchen, located just across a small parking area from the building, says she thinks it needs to be demolished.

“If I could buy it, I’d make it a parking lot,” Caron said Monday. “If I had the funds to do anything with it, I’d tear it down and haul it off and make it a parking lot or have grass and a gazebo and make it nice and the people in the city could use it if they wanted to.”

Lifelong resident Tom Nale, a lawyer, retired district court judge and member of the city’s Planning Board, said the fact that the building has been in such disrepair for many years is shameful.

“At one time, it stood for doing good stuff and it is just shameful, what it is today,” he said. “There’s got to be a process where the city can condemn it.”

A long history

Construction of 6 Main Place started before Colby College moved to Mayflower Hill from downtown, with that move starting in 1930 and ending in 1952. The building was used mostly as a women’s gymnasium.

Foss Hall, a brick building near 6 Main Place, was built in 1901 as a Colby College women’s dormitory and now is used as professional offices. They are the only two Colby buildings from the college’s former campus downtown that remain intact.

In 1941, George Averill, a philanthropist and chairman of the Colby board, gave the city $75,000 to buy 6 Main and give it to the Boys Club, which at the time was located on Temple Street, near where Yardgoods Center on The Concourse is now. Temple Street back then stretched from Head of Falls to Elm Street. The Boys Club had been on Temple Street since 1924 after Colby students spearheaded an effort to establish the club. When the club moved to Main Place, its former building on Temple Street became the home of the YMCA.

The boys club sold the property in 1999 to a man who owned Dunkin’ Donuts in Waterville at the time, and he later sold it to another entity. The Boys & Girls Club moved to North Street in 1999 and became the Alfond Youth Center, housing both the club and the YMCA. Northern Ventures LLC of Saco bought the property in 2006.

It has changed hands a few times since then. In 2006, contractor Uria Pelletier bought it and hoped to renovate it and possibly lease space inside. The city at the time listed the value of the building at $74,400 and the land at $57,100, for a total value of $131,500. In 2021, Pelletier, finding renovation costs prohibitive, sold it to an investment group.