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December 23, 2022

Waterbury pays $2.3M for massive factory building with eye toward redevelopment

HBJ PHOTO | MICHAEL PUFFER Waterbury Mayor Neil O’Leary at the 17-acre Anamet industrial complex. The city is searching for a developer to take on the site even as it continues a multimillion-dollar cleanup.
By Michael Puffer

The city of Waterbury acquired a 6-acre property and a massive aging industrial building on Freight Street, adjacent to the downtown, in a $2.3 million deal recorded Dec. 20.

The city intends to demolish the century-old, 138,304-square-foot building and clean up any pollution found on-site. This will allow the city to eventually offer the property, along with two neighboring industrial properties, as a 20-acre blank slate for redevelopment in a strategic location.

In addition to being adjacent to the downtown, the Freight Street properties are near the city’s passenger rail station and offer easy access to Route 8 and Interstate 84. Over the past several years, the city has spent millions – mostly from grants – upgrading the streets, sidewalks and underground utilities around the Freight Street corridor, seeing it as one of the most promising areas for future development and grand list growth.

The city bought the property from 170 Freight Street LLC, whose principals are Marcel Veronneau – a prominent Waterbury businessman who died in August 2021 – and Tammy Zollo, of Prospect.

The city had previously acquired two neighboring properties – 130 Freight St. and 000 West Main St. – and is in the process of demolishing the last building in a crumbling factory complex with a long history of pollution problems. Those two properties, along with 170 Freight, had once served the Anaconda American Brass Co.

Later, 130 Freight St. and 000 West Main St. hosted Environmental Waste Resources, a company that received and disposed of manufacturing wastes. The company was cited repeatedly for lapses by the state and went bankrupt in 1998. It left behind industrial wastes in storage tanks and barrels that was cleaned at the state’s expense.

The cost to demolish the building at 170 Freight St. and clear subsurface pollution is unknown, but very likely to run in the millions of dollars, which is one of the reasons Waterbury had been burdened by several immense and decaying industrial complexes following the collapse of the brass industry.

Mayor Neil O’Leary’s administration has been able to draw in tens-of-millions in state and federal grants to help tackle these dangerous eyesores, which in the past have been magnets for vandalism and illegal dumping, as well as scenes of large, dangerous fires. A brick wall of the largest factory building at 130 Freight St. had been bowing out toward the sidewalk before it was demolished.

The city has assembled roughly $68.8 million – predominantly from state and federal grants – for upgrades in and around the Freight Street Corridor.

O’Leary said he hopes to begin demolition of 170 Freight St. in January. He expects subsurface tests will be conducted next year. O’Leary hopes to see a mix of commercial and residential development, but much will depend on the results of environmental tests.

“We will know a lot more a year from now in terms of what we can do with the property and what we can’t do with the property,” O’Leary said. 
 

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