BRUNSWICK
Principals of a Wiscassetbased nonprofit have signed a purchase-and-sale agreement on two town buildings but now are waiting for Brunswick Development Corporation to approve the deal, worth a reported $300,000.
Such approval could come Thursday, when the Brunswick Development Corporation — a private, nonprofit Brunswick-based holding group — is next scheduled to convene.
The meeting is slated for 10:30 a.m. in the municipal building at 28 Federal St. — which, along with the adjacent Parks and Recreation building at 30 Federal St., is one of the properties to be sold.
Coastal Enterprises Inc., currently housed in three buildings on Water Street in Wiscasset, plans to relocate its state headquarters and about 60 employees to Brunswick’s downtown by 2015.
When — and if — the sale of both buildings is finalized, they will be razed and replaced with a modern, efficient structure, said John Egan, CEI’s director of housing.
“We’ve been ironing out the final terms for the past two weeks,” Egan said, “mostly legal stuff, the syntax and wording. But the basic agreement has been in place for a while now.”
Pending BDC’s agreement, CEI plans to hire architects and designers in September and “spend the winter in the design review and permitting process,” with the idea of breaking ground as soon in the spring as the town can vacate Federal Street for its new home in the soon-to-berenamed McLellan Building on Union Street.
Although the square footage of the potential buildings on Federal Street won’t differ substantially from its current space, the difference will be that the Brunswick headquarters will be purposebuilt to fit CEI’s needs.
“We’re overwhelmed with the reception we’re getting in Brunswick,” Egan said. “It’s a great downtown.”
If no problems arise, Egan’s ideal construction schedule would have the new facility built and ready for occupancy within 10 months of the town’s departure in April, dropping CEI into the town’s tax ledger early in 2015.
Municipal officials already approved sale of 30 Federal St. to BDC, for a sum of “not less than $200,000” in May and used the proceeds to plug a school funding gap in the town’s 2014 budget.
Likewise, the existing town office has been promised to BDC for more than a year, as part of a land swap that made possible construction of the new police station at the corner of Stanwood and Pleasant streets.
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