Chicopee’s Planning and Development Director Lee Pouliot discusses the MassWorks grant the city received to help jumpstart the design phase for the Uniroyal property.
Photo credit: ChicopeeTV
CHICOPEE — At its Jan. 6 meeting, the City Council accepted a $450,000 grant to support the necessary infrastructure improvements associated with the redevelopment of the former Uniroyal property.
The grant, which comes from the Massachusetts Executive Office of Economic Development’s MassWorks Infrastructure Program, was part of a mayoral order that went in front of the council at the end of the meeting.
Planning and Development Director Lee Pouliot explained that the MassWorks infrastructure program is a “reimbursable grant program from the state that looks to support the design, engineering and construction of public infrastructure that is in support of large scale catalytic projects that particularly prioritize housing.”
The grant is for early-stage design and engineering development for all the infrastructure systems in the Chicopee Falls neighborhood that will either need upgrades or replacements to support bringing the Uniroyal property online.
Pouliot stated that the city negotiated a real estate option with a preferred developer that was selected through a requests for proposals process for the property.
Although the details are still being finalized, Pouliot said the developer is working on the early development stages of their plan. The former tire manufacturing plant closed operations in 1980 and sold their property to the Facemate Corporation in 1981.
Facemate leased portions of the Uniroyal buildings to various companies for manufacturing, printing, machine shops, office, storage and health care facilities.
Michelin North America Inc. then acquired Uniroyal assets in the 1990s before the city ultimately gained ownership of the property.
The project site consists of more than 70 acres adjacent to the Chicopee River that have been vacant since 2003.
Since 2010, the city has conducted a master planning process to introduce two redevelopment visions for the Uniroyal and adjacent Facemate properties. Over the course of that time, the city has completed a brownfields assessment, removed hazardous materials, completed an intensive cleanup and conducted a fill program to level off each site with the levy.
From the city’s standpoint, Pouliot said, “We are being proactive and working towards constructing the infrastructure that’s going to be needed to support this very large scale project.”
The redevelopment project is a $300 million investment, according to Pouliot and is housing focused.
“We’ll be working very closely with the developer and our own consultants to prepare that work in hopes that we’ll be prepared for future MassWorks rounds to apply for construction funding,” Pouliot stated.
The MassWorks grant award that Chicopee received is for $450,000, but since it is a reimbursement program, there is a $50,000 cost share that the city is obligated to invest towards the project.
The City Council approved accepting the grant and appropriation to fund the grant.
Mayor John Vieau shared his feelings on the grant, stating, “[I’m] excited that we applied and received this grant from MassWorks. We were embargoed for a few months; we’ve known that we received it and excited to shared it with you today and moving forward with the projects in the West Main Street area.”
City Councilor Joel McAuliffe talked about how this grant will help benefit the city by having the infrastructure in place as the project moves forward.
“MassWorks grants are very important to greasing the skids, if you will, for development,” McAuliffe said. “It gives the city an opportunity to leverage resources from outside of our city to fix the infrastructure in that particular area; target it to that particular area. There’s a very small matching amount, but the impact is very significant.”
