TOPSHAM

The agency charged with redeveloping the former Brunswick Naval Air Station is selling one building and demolishing another.

Sale of a former fire station at Topsham Commerce Park to Firehouse Realty LLC for $150,000 is scheduled to close today, said Midcoast Regional Redevelopment Authority Director Steve Levesque. The building will be converted into a gymnastics school.

Levesque described the former fire station as a single-story, 5,000-squarefoot structure.

A building also used by the Army Reserve for recruiting will meet a different fate. That building will likely be demolished.

Levesque on Tuesday said the building is becoming an “attractive nuisance” subject to vandalism.

“It’s been sitting there for a few years,” said Levesque. “It hasn’t been heated … just deteriorating rapidly and losing value.”

The land on which the building sits, which will be made available for development, will have more value with the building gone, said Levesque.

Demolition will take place this summer.

Also, last week MRRA’s board of directors approved the authority’s fiscal year 2016 budget. Total revenues are projected at a little more than $5 million. Expenditures total nearly $7 mil- lion, but will be offset by almost $1.2 million in transfers from the 2015 fiscal year.

Brunswick Executive Airport will run at a $220,000 deficit.

Levesque said it was projected that the airport, which turned four years old in April, would run a deficit for its first five to seven years of operation. It is expected to be in the black next fiscal year.

There are 12 tenants at the airport, generating lease revenue projected at $763,400, an increase of $185,000 more than the 2015 fiscal year. Meanwhile, spending on heating for buildings at the airport has decreased $137,000.

In other base redevelopment news:

— Members of Maine’s congressional delegation announced that Brunswick Executive Airport has been awarded a $150,000 FAA grant to seal cracks on the runway. Levesque said the grant was part of the airport’s annual improvement program. Wiscasset Airport also received $100,000 to help purchase a plow and snow removal carrier vehicle. Two York County airports also received grant funding.

“Airports in these communities are critical pieces of Maine’s transportation infrastructure,” said Rep. Chellie Pingree, D-Maine. “I’m glad this federal investment will help them make improvements and purchase the equipment they need to ensure safe and efficient operations.”

— Village Green Ventures has broken ground on a 750 kilowatt anaerobic digester that will generate power, produced from the gas generated as a byproduct of when bacteria breaks down manure. Located at the south end of Brunswick Executive Airport’s ramp, the plant will produce electricity for Brunswick Landing, and may help keep energy costs competitive for Brunswick Landing tenants. Construction of the plant ought to be completed this fall. Plant construction will start this week and should be complete before winter.

— Levesque has won the 2015 Association of Defense Communities’ Community Leadership Award. The award recognizes those communities, installations, public officials and military leaders demonstrating leadership, innovation and excellence. The award will be presented during the third annual Congressional Breakfast Awards ceremony in Washington on June 24.

jswinconeck@timesrecord.com

LAST WEEK, Midcoast Regional Redevelopment Authority’s board of directors approved the authority’s fiscal year 2016 budget. Total revenues are projected at a little more than $5 million. Expenditures total nearly $7 million, but will be offset by almost $1.2 million in transfers from the 2015 fiscal year.

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