It was a little more than a half a year ago that we were lauding in this space a plan for a site in Southington that could easily have been abandoned as hopeless. The Beaton & Corbin factory on North Main Street has long presented a challenge to efforts to remediate so contaminated a site. The abandoned plumbing fixtures factory closed in 1989, and caught fire in 2003.
As town Economic Development Director Lou Perillo has put it, what makes the 1.65-acre site so challenging is that there’s “so much contamination on such a small site.”
It’s probably not surprising that so complicated a problem prompted a complex solution. Under an agreement, the town will sell the tax and sewer liens it has on the property to the nonprofit Connecticut Brownfield Land Bank, for a dollar. The land bank will foreclose on the property, clearing the title and sell it to local developer Mark Lovley, for a dollar. He will contribute $150,000 toward environmental remediation. The Environmental Protection Agency is loaning Lovely $400,000 for the cleanup and the town is also putting in $150,000. Cleanup efforts will be under the supervision of the EPA and the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection.
Cleanup is expected to be complete by December or the beginning of next year. Lovley is planning for two medical office buildings on the site.
Clearly the town is fortunate to have a developer willing to turn an eyesore into an asset, and also one willing to have the patience it will take to see that take place. That work is now beginning, with tree clearing and cleanup, is a most encouraging sign, and both the town and developer should be given credit for efforts from which the entire town will benefit.