GARDINER — Two companies have stepped forward with their qualifications to indicate they’re interested in redeveloping a brownfields site in Gardiner.
By Friday’s deadline, Developers Collaborative and Anchor Health Properties submitted documents in response to the city of Gardiner’s request for qualifications issued in October to take on redeveloping the former T.W. Dick site on Summer Street into a medical arts building to house expanded facilities for MaineGeneral Medical Center.
“When you put something out like this, you’re never sure if anyone will respond,” Patrick Wright, Gardiner’s economic and community development coordinator, said. “I’m excited that two companies have expressed interest in the project.”
Both companies have experience developing projects in Maine.
Developers Collaborative, based in Portland, developed the Androscoggin Medical Arts Center in Livermore Falls, the Brunswick Station Downtown medical office building, the Midcoast Medical Center in Bath, and Gilman Place — the former Waterville High School building — among others.
Anchor Health Properties, based in Delaware but partnering with DiGiorgio Associates, a Boston-based architectural firm with an office in Farmingdale, has developed satellite outpatient centers for Central Maine Medical Center in the Lewiston region, the Redington-Fairview General Hospital Medical Office Building in Skowhegan and the Mayo Regional Hospital in Dover-Foxcroft among others.
This is an early step in the process of identifying a developer to take on the project. As spelled out in the request for qualifications, a committee will review the proposals, interview the developers and identify a candidate to recommend to the Gardiner City Council at its Dec. 2 meeting. If the City Council chooses a developer, the successful candidate would put together a plan to design and pay for and build the project.
Having a developer and a project for the brownfields site is key to unlocking additional funds for remediation that originate from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The site, which most recently was used by T.W. Dick for its steel fabrication facility, has been the site of industrial processes for the better part of two centuries. City officials have already secured $400,000 in EPA grants to pay for an assessment of the property. The assessment showed the presence of a number of contaminants.
The city, working with MaineGeneral, has envisioned a project that will relocate medical offices from their current location on Dresden Avenue. When it’s open, the facility will house a primary care facility with extended hours, imaging and lab services and specialty practices.
Jessica Lowell — 621-5632
Twitter: @JLowellKJ
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