Connecticut's Political Leaders Secure $125M Federal Grant for Portion of Interchange Upgrade
Tue October 29, 2024 - Northeast Edition CEG
Connecticut political leaders secure $125M federal grant for
Interstate interchange upgrade in Meriden. The grant supports phase 3 of the
project, aimed at reducing congestion, improving safety, and modernizing the
dangerous roadway configuration. Construction to be completed by 2030, with
estimated total project cost exceeding $500M. Project funded by bipartisan
infrastructure law, creating jobs and enhancing infrastructural development.
A $125 million competitive grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) was awarded to the Connecticut to support the third phase of a construction project designed to reconfigure the dangerous roadway interchange that connects Interstate 91, Interstate 691 and Conn. Route 15 in Meriden.
The joint announcement was made Oct. 18 through Gov. Ned
Lamont and included the state's two Democratic U.S. senators, Richard
Blumenthal and Chris Murphy, Congresswomen Rosa DeLauro, D-3rd District and
Jahana Hayes, D-5th District, Congressman John B. Larson, D-1st District, and
Transportation Commissioner Garrett Eucalitto.
The funding was delivered to the Connecticut Department of
Transportation (CTDOT) through President Joe Biden's Bipartisan Infrastructure
Law (BIL), which he signed into law three years ago.
The interchange is one of Connecticut's most congested,
outdated and crash-prone highway corridors — so much so that the state's
political leaders have been unified in working to secure the federal monies
that will enable the state to complete the major reconfiguration.
Currently, CTDOT is building the second of the project's
three phases. The construction's overall goal is to reduce congestion and
improve safety by eliminating dangerous weaving points, correcting roadway
geometry, and adding multi-lane exits.
Upon completion of Phase 3, expected in 2030, the project
will see the replacement and rehabilitation of several bridges and the addition
and extension of auxiliary lanes to reduce crashes and improve traffic flow.
In the news release, Lamont said his administration has made
the highway reconfiguration a priority "because it's about time that we do
something about the backups, crashes and delays that this oddly designed
section of roadway causes nearly every day."
He admitted that due to it being in such a heavily traveled
part of the state near Hartford, "it's going to take some time to
complete, but ultimately central Connecticut will benefit from finally easing
the congestion on these highways.
"I applaud Connecticut's outstanding Congressional
delegation for not only helping to get this law passed but also working to
ensure that our state benefits from it in a major way," Lamont continued.
"I thank the Biden-Harris administration and the U.S. Department of
Transportation for working with our administration to secure the funding for
this important project."
Murphy noted in his comments, "Getting through the
congestion on I-91, I-691, and Route 15 has become a daily headache for
Connecticut drivers. This $125 million in federal dollars from the Bipartisan
Infrastructure Law will help realign ramps, replace aging bridges, improve
drainage and support other long-needed infrastructure upgrades that streamline
the flow of traffic, create good-paying jobs and ensure a safer, smoother
commute for thousands of people."
Entire Project Likely to Cost Over $500 Million
The cost of the project's first phase totaled $80 million
and was entirely funded by Connecticut. The second portion of the work is
supported by a combination of $50 million in state funding and $200 million
federal funding from the BIL. The third phase will be supported by the $125
million federal grant just announced, as well as additional state funding.
Combined, the expenditure for all three phases is
anticipated to be more than $500 million.
CTDOT's I-91/I-691/Route 15 Interchangement overhaul
includes a project labor agreement with the building trades, providing
good-paying jobs and workforce development training for the next generation of
workers, Lamont noted.
The initial phase of work began in early 2023 and is aimed
at repairing bridges, adding a lane of traffic to I-91, and making related road
improvements. It includes:
Realigning and reconfiguring the ramp to two lanes to meet
traffic demand from I-691 eastbound to I-91 northbound (Exit 1A to old Exit
11).
Building a bridge replacement due to the proposed ramp
realignment.
Adding an auxiliary lane on I-91 northbound to relieve
congestion and improve safety caused by a steep uphill grade.
This past June, the project's second slate of work got under
way and includes:
Adding a new two-lane exit ramp from Route 15 to I-91
northbound to reduce traffic congestion on the Exit 68 North/East ramp.
Closing the existing Exit 17 ramp from I-91 northbound to
Route 15 northbound and re-routing traffic to Exit 16 to provide a two-lane
exit ramp with a right-side traffic merge onto Route 15 northbound.
Reconfiguring the existing Exit 68 West ramp from Route 15
northbound to I-691 westbound to two lanes.
Rebuilding the acceleration and deceleration lanes to
provide adequate traffic weaving distances to improve safety.
When the third phase begins, crews will:
Build a new two-lane exit ramp from Route 15 southbound to
I-91 southbound to reduce traffic congestion on the existing Exit 67 ramp.
Construct another new two-lane I-91 southbound ramp to Route
15 southbound to cut down on the amount of traffic tie-ups on the existing Exit
17 ramp.
Reconfigure the ramp from I-691 eastbound to Route 15
southbound (Exit 10) to two lanes.
Redo the ramp from I-91 southbound to I-691 westbound (Exit
18) to make it two lanes.
"This redesign will provide relief to the countless
motorists who pass through every day and provide much-needed infrastructure
upgrades," explained Blumenthal. "I will continue fighting to deliver
federal investments to Connecticut that make our roads and highways more safe
and secure."
"When my fellow Congressional members and I worked on
the Bipartisan Infrastructure Act, we understood the law's potential to benefit
communities throughout the state," noted DeLauro, who added that with the
funding now in place for the third phase of work on the Meriden highway
interchanges, "we are generating well-paying jobs, fixing bridges,
expanding traffic lanes on I-91, making our roads safer and enhancing road
conditions."
Officials get tour of Coast Guard museum site, update on construction
Elizabeth Regan
New London ― Local, state and military officials on Tuesday
celebrated the imminent construction of the National Coast Guard Museum behind
Union Station.
After a decade of derailments, the latest estimates suggest
the glass doors to the estimated $150 million museum could open in 2026.
Amid lunchtime nibbles and speeches at the Garde Arts
Center, National Coast Guard Museum Association Chief Operating Officer Mark
Walsh said steel will begin rising in December from 204 thick concrete mats
that serve as the foundation of the 89,000-square-foot, six-story building. The
frame of the building is expected to be complete in the spring of next year.
Association President West Pulver, a retired Coast Guard
captain, put it this way: “It’s a lot of steel coming.”
Association Board of Directors Chairwoman Susan Curtin
credited almost 7,000 private donors with raising $48.3 million so far toward
the association’s $50 million goal.
U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy, chairman of the U.S. Senate
Appropriations Subcommittee on Homeland Security that oversees the Coast Guard,
credited himself with securing a matching $50 million in federal funding to
keep the floundering project afloat.
That leaves the museum association with the task of raising
another $50 million.
Patti Fazio, the association’s director of marketing and
communications, said Tuesday afternoon that the association is investigating
financing options.
U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., told the crowd
there’s no going back now.
“We’re launched; there’s liftoff. And we see the landing in
2026. It’s within sight,” he said. “There’s still going to be financial
challenges, but we are determined to do whatever is necessary for the federal
government to meet its obligation to establish this museum. It is long
overdue.”
The Coast Guard remains the only branch of the armed
services without a national museum.
U.S. Rep. Joe Courtney, D-2nd District, said federal funding
for the museum is another symbol of the importance of maritime pursuits ―
historically and in the future ― to the region.
“This is all happening at a time when the southeastern part
of our state is really becoming a maritime history center of excellence,” he
said.
The association’s Board of Directors on June 12 approved
allotting $40 million for the current phase of construction, which includes the
installation of the concrete mats consisting of rods drilled into the bedrock
10 feet deep to provide the stability needed to support the building.
The first phase of the museum project involved dismantling a
portion of City Pier and installing a bulkhead wall to create land where there
was once water.
Fazio said the board of directors plans to allocate funding
for the next phase of construction in early 2025 to complete the exterior and
interior of the building.
Mayor Michael Passero recognized an infusion of state and
federal grant funding that has helped prepare the city to welcome an expected
300,000 museum visitors per year.
He pointed to streetscape improvements on Bank Street, the
historic renovation of downtown buildings and the planned expansion of the
Water Street parking garage by 400 spaces.
“There is no more appropriate site for this museum than on
the banks of this historic harbor in this Coast Guard city,” Passero said.
The sentiment manifested itself after a group tour of the
museum site when a driver slowed down to call out “looking sharp!” to several
members of the Coast Guard standing next to Union Station in their dress
uniforms.
“Thank you for your service,” the driver said.
New Haven Gateway Terminal gets $34 million for green technology and to reduce emissions
NEW HAVEN — New Haven will receive $34.03
million in federal funding for zero-emission equipment and energy storage
infrastructure for its port as part of President Joe Biden's efforts
to improve infrastructure, provide union jobs and address the global climate
crisis.
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency officials announced
this week that $3 billion in Clean Ports grants funded by the Inflation
Reduction Act will be disseminated to 55 projects, including New Haven's
Gateway Terminal.
In addition to New
Haven's $34 million in grant funding for zero-emission technology, the
Connecticut Port Authority at the New London Pier will also receive $5.36
million.
EPA Administrator Michael S. Regan said on a call with
reporters Monday that ports are "the backbone of our nation's
economy," but the environmental impacts to surrounding communities, such
as air pollution from exhaust, cannot be overlooked.
“Healthy communities and a strong economy go hand in hand,”
he said.
According to the agency, New Haven's $34 million grant
will fund the purchase and deployment of zero-emission cargo
handling equipment with supporting charging infrastructure, with solar
generation and energy storage infrastructure to power the mobile equipment.
Diesel cargo handling equipment will also be scrapped to
reduce air pollution at the port and in the surrounding area as part of the
project.
Regan said the awarded projects "met a
very rigorous process," part of which included demonstrating the
projects' ability to ensure they could meet their goals of reducing pollution
for neighboring communities.
Regan said the funds would be disbursed in December and
January and obligated before the end of the Biden administration this coming
January. It will take three to four years to implement the 55 projects, based
on the scale of the projects, he said.
Nationwide, it's estimated the Clean Ports program will
eliminate more than 3 million metric tons of carbon pollution over the first 10
years of implementation, equivalent to 391,220 homes' energy use for one year,
according to the EPA.
The project is projected to support an estimated 40,000 jobs
across the nation, including more than 6,500 manufacturing jobs. It was not
immediately clear how many of those would be in Connecticut.
Bridgeport soccer project comes with a price tag near $100M, documents show
BRIDGEPORT — While the developers of the proposed minor
league soccer stadium have repeatedly declined to offer specifics
about its estimated cost, a grant application shows the initial price tag was
close to $100 million as of roughly a year ago.
Businessman Andre Swanston's Connecticut Sports Group did
not dispute the figures on a months-old budget form that was part of a partially
successful effort to acquire aid from the state's Community Investment Fund.
The initial ask was for $30 million and
in June the project was instead awarded $8 million.
According to that budget document, recently reviewed by
Hearst Connecticut Media Group, the stadium's soft costs for things like
architectural work, engineering, land costs and permits added up to $20.7
million, with the hard costs — environmental remediation, demolition of
existing structures, construction — totaling $75.5 million.
Combined those amounts add up to $96.2 million, including a $4.5 million
contingency.
"That number seems in the ballpark, in the range,"
state Rep. Christopher Rosario, D-Bridgeport, a proponent of the stadium, said
this week.
"I know the total project cost of the stadium itself
was something near that," agreed another supporter, state Rep. Antonio
Felipe, D-Bridgeport.
The sports venue would be built on the lower East Side, at
Kossuth Street and Stratford Avenue, along the Pequonnock River and near
the harbor on a former greyhound racing track and ex-rubber factory. The plan
also calls for the eventual construction of housing, a hotel and retail
establishments, with the ultimate goal of luring a major league soccer team to
Bridgeport.
When
he revealed his plan last fall, Swanston's timeline was an aggressive
one, with the stadium open by early next year for the start of the 2025 soccer
season. And in January he announced the team — the Connecticut United Football
Club, which will participate in Major League Soccer Next Pro, a lower-division
league associated with Major League Soccer.
But due to financing and construction delays ground has yet
to be broken, and in August Connecticut Sports Group set
a new stadium grand opening date of 2026.
All along details about the cost and monetary sources have
not been provided. Asked for a comment about the $96.2 million, Swanston in a
statement instead reiterated his prior claims about how the stadium and the
overall waterfront redevelopment will be "transformative," bring
"world-class sports and entertainment to the region," generate $4
billion in economic impact by 2050, create 1,000 new permanent jobs, 1,000
housing units and "further position Bridgeport as a regional hub for
tourism."
He concluded, "We look forward to continuing to work
with city and state officials, small business owners, corporate leaders, and
community members to bring this visionary project to life, contributing to the
long-term success of Connecticut."
In an interview earlier this month, before Hearst had
obtained more information about the stadium's initial $96.2 million
budget, the developer said "my wife and I have already spent millions
of our own money." Swanston is a multimillionaire technology entrepreneur
who attended the University of Connecticut.
Swanston has also said he has been assembling substantial
private backing, but again declined to provide more information.
He said he is unwilling to "say what a final budget
will be" because of some uncertainties and "variables." Among
those is an issue constructing the stadium's foundation that was cited as one
key reason for putting off the opening until 2026.
"I don't want to call it quicksand but it is not sturdy
soil," Swanston said, meaning it will take more time, money and effort to
install the necessary foundation at the Kossuth Street and Stratford Avenue
land.
Swanston did acknowledge that the longer it takes to break
ground and build his vision, the higher the price tag.
"Time is money," he said.
Swanston has continually made it clear the stadium will
require public investment, though exactly how much is unclear. So far state
officials have provided the $8 million from the Community Investment Fund,
along with an additional $8 million from the Connecticut Department of Economic
and Community Development for cleaning up old and contaminated industrial
sites.
Connecticut Soccer Group said the application to the
Community Investment Fund for $30 million "was a particular request
reflecting the constraints of that program" and more financial details
will be revealed during the upcoming state legislative session early next year.
Felipe said he understands Swanston is seeking public
financing to cover "in the ballpark of 50 percent or less" of the
project.
"The number in my head has always been somewhere in the
range from 45 to 50 million (dollars)," Felipe said.
Rosario, meanwhile, feels a 40 percent state
investment might be more realistic given Gov. Ned Lamont has
in prior interviews been hesitant to commit state dollars to the endeavor.
Even the $16 million offered so far has been characterized as an investment in
cleaning up the property for future economic development, whether for a stadium
or another project.
"Generally speaking, I like to see significant private
investment for something like this," Lamont
said in June, echoing
his comments from January. "We’re doing our part ... in terms of
environmental cleanup and the brownfields. I think this is going to be a
privately initiated endeavor.”
Felipe and Rosario agreed that the 2025 legislative session,
when fellow Democrat Lamont and the legislature will craft a new two-year state
budget, will be crucial to the stadium's future.
"It absolutely needs to be a priority of the upcoming
session," Felipe said. "Eventually if we take too much time and don’t
start committing something to this they (Major League Soccer Next Pro) will see
this as a non-reality and go somewhere else.”
Rosario said he is "cautiously optimistic" about
state lawmakers providing more funds for the stadium and agreed with Felipe
that there is a need for "some real serious progress" in that regard.
"The positive thing Andre's got going for him, we have
high level execs from Major League Soccer," Rosario said. "That is
real. There is real interest to make this happen."
West Hartford finalizing design of new community center, which could cost $55 million to build
WEST HARTFORD — Plans
for a new community center are moving along, with the town now looking to
hire a construction firm to build the brand new facility.
The Elmwood Community Center, which will bring together
the senior center, teen center, a library branch and more into one central
building, has been in the works for a few years now, with plans formulating
after the
town bought the former St. Brigid School at 100 Mayflower St. in 2021.
The town
hired GWWO Architects earlier this year to begin designing what the
new 82,000 square foot community center would look like. Bob Palmer, the town's
director of plant and facility services, said at this month's Public Works,
Facilities and Sustainability Committee meeting that those design plans are
still in the early stages.
"At this point, we've had three meetings and the
schematic design is about 50 percent complete," Palmer said. "We're
finalizing adjacencies of where offices are and where different departments
that are going to be in the building are going to be located. There's a lot of
common shared spaces in this building too. We're looking at all those and how
that's going to work, how the building functions, how the flow of people will
go. There's a lot going into this at this point... a lot of thought and effort
going into laying out the building so that it's going to work for
everybody."
Helen Rubino-Turco, the town's director of leisure services,
said at last week's Human and Community Services Committee meeting that plans
are also materializing for the demolition of the existing structure, as the
town has opted to build a completely brand new building rather than renovate
and reuse any part of the former school. The building is currently being used
by the town's police and fire departments, as well as social services for food
distribution. The
site is also home to the town's temporary dog park, which will have to
vacate once demolition begins. Rubino-Turco said that process could begin in
late winter.
According to the town's request for proposal for its
construction manager, which Palmer said is who will actually build
the facility, the construction portion of the project is estimated to cost
around $55 million. Previously, the town had estimated the entire process —
including costs expanding beyond the actual construction — would
cost around $66 million. The town has also said it will look at using $55
million in bond funding to pay for the construction.
Once complete, the town's new Elmwood Community Center
will replace the aging community center on New Britain Avenue that was
originally built nearly 100 years ago in 1931. The building, which was used as
an elementary school into the late 1970s, was completely renovated in the early
1980s when it was determined that it would become a community center.
Currently, the space is shared by the Elmwood Senior Center, the town's teen
center and a private daycare.
The town's proposal for its construction manager said it was
seeking to build a new community center as issues at the current center, citing
"handicapped accessibility, aging building infrastructure, site access and
parking issues, program constraints" as persistent problems.
Simmons, Board Finance on Collision Course Over Stamford School Construction Costs
Angela Carella
STAMFORD – Mayor Caroline Simmons and the Board of Finance
are on a collision course over a multi-year, multi-school rebuilding plan that
could cost the city $1 billion, and require that the state contribute the
same.
The risk of a crash increased when Simmons obtained an
opinion from the law department saying she doesn’t need approval from elected
boards to fund the next step for a new Roxbury Elementary School, Board of
Finance members said last week during a special meeting called to discuss
construction costs.
Simmons obtained the legal opinion after finance board
members rejected her request for $895,000 to begin design work on Roxbury. One
reason they turned down the request, board members said, is that the total
project cost has jumped from $86 million to $131 million.
The other reason is their overriding concern about the first
school project in the pipeline – reconstruction of Westhill High. That started
at $300 million, skyrocketed to $500 million, and most recently landed at $460
million, board members said.
The problem for the Democratic mayor is that she will need
approval from the six-member Board of Finance – meaning at least four votes –
for upcoming construction phases at Roxbury, and for funding authorizations for
Westhill and two new schools planned for south of Interstate-95. The mayor also
will need Board of Representatives approvals.
Finance board member Dennis Mahoney said during the meeting
that the mayor’s “stunt” to bypass the elected boards jeopardizes the
likelihood she will win the votes she needs to move her school plans forward.
“The administration walked right onto a track where a
locomotive is coming at them,” Mahoney said. “They clearly are not interested
in any sort of collaboration or they wouldn’t have pulled what I call a stunt
to find a way to avoid the public scrutiny that interacting with the Board of
Finance and the Board of Representatives allows.”
Days before a heated national election in which former
President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris charge that democracy
is on the line, “this is a microcosm of that,” Mahoney said. “The mayor has
taken away the authority of the democratically elected boards to be a check on
what she does. She once agreed to this approval process and now, because she
hasn’t gotten what she wanted on Roxbury, she’s pulling away from the process.
I think she is making a mistake. She should follow the normal course.”
Opinion without an objective
Now Mahoney and fellow Republican finance board member J.R.
McMullen are requesting another special meeting, this one seeking a
“non-conflicted” legal opinion about whether Simmons may pay contractors to
proceed with the Roxbury design without board approval.
Mahoney and McMullen said they are not seeking advice from
Director of Legal Affairs Thomas Cassone, who wrote the opinion for Simmons, or
other city attorneys. Cassone is a mayoral appointee and member of the mayor’s
cabinet, and the city’s legal staff works for him, so they want an outside
opinion, the two board members said.
Cassone’s opinion stated that board approval is not required
when “a majority of the funding is provided by the federal or state
government.” Roxbury falls under that condition because the state has agreed to
pay a majority, 60 percent, or nearly $52 million of the $86 million cost for
Roxbury, Cassone wrote.
McMullen’s argument is that the state is no longer paying a
majority of the cost because the Roxbury project now is expected to be about
$131 million.
McMullen said he wants an outside attorney to discuss the
mayor’s “violation” of the city’s purchasing ordinance. Mahoney concurred,
saying “it is important to protect the taxpayers from a mayor that wishes to
sideline the other democratically elected officials on the largest investment
program in the history of the city.”
Democratic finance board Chair Richard Freedman disagreed
with Mahoney and McMullen, saying the board rarely approves contracts for
professional services such as preliminary design. The Roxbury project will
ultimately require approval from the Board of Finance and the Board of
Representatives since the capital cost is “going to be way over the currently
authorized budget,” Freedman told CT Examiner.
But during the meeting Mahoney said the city’s school
rebuilding plan is different because of the sheer scope and cost.
“The city told us that this is such a large project over
multiple decades that they need to have buy-in from all the democratically
elected institutions, so they’re going to go the extra mile and make sure
everybody has bought into this,” Mahoney said. “I know what the rules are, but
the unwritten agreement between the board and the mayor was that we would have
real input.”
The school rebuilding plan, which includes repairing
existing buildings, originally was estimated at $1.5 billion and now stands at
$2 billion, finance board members said. The state is expected to fund roughly
half of that.
Obligation to move forward
In an email to the Board of Finance and Board of
Representatives, Simmons wrote that while she respects their involvement in the
process, “I have been clear that investing in our school facilities and
embarking on this unprecedented school construction building program is one of
my administration’s priorities. Given the deteriorating condition of Roxbury, I
have an obligation to students, teachers, and parents to ensure the
construction of a safe, modern, and high-quality learning environment.
Therefore, I will be directing the director of operations to move forward with
the schematic design for the Roxbury K-8 project.”
Pending the outcome of McMullen’s request for an outside
legal opinion, finance board members are continuing their quest for more
details about the massive Westhill project, which motivated their refusal to
authorize the spending on Roxbury.
During last week’s meeting they drew up a list of requests
to the mayor’s office for more detailed information on what is driving the cost
increase for Westhill.
Members said that, a couple of hours before their meeting
began, they received an email from Director of Operations Matt Quinones with
some updates. But it was “the same numbers typed in a different font,” said
board member Mary Lou Rinaldi, a Democrat.
Quinones wrote that he directed the design team to reduce
the size of the new building by 15,000 square feet. So far a cut of about
10,000 square feet has been identified, Quinones said.
The city is talking with the Board of Education about
whether to rebuild the pool at Westhill at a cost of $19 million, he said. The
city anticipates “having a proposed alternative option fully vetted by the end
of design development,” Quinones wrote.
The city is pursuing a $20 million federal tax credit by
including geothermal mechanisms in the design, and seeking other federal money,
he said.
The design team is “value engineering,” Quinones said, and
so far has cut $800,000 in costs and identified $4.5 million in potential
reductions.
Only if ‘you have to pay for it’
Westhill’s original price tag of $300 million meant the
city’s share would be $60 million. Quinones said that with the “encouraging”
work being done to reduce costs, and the anticipation of federal grants, the
city’s share may be $85 million to $95 million.
“That’s not that much more” than the original $60 million,
Freedman said.
“It is to the people who have to pay for it,” Rinaldi said.
Rinaldi said the updates from Quinones are fuzzy, and not
much different from what the board heard over the summer. She questioned
whether making a list of requests is “just a waste of time” for the board.
“If we’re going to go over the numbers as a rationale for
why it costs so much, without a real effort to get the numbers down, then my
vote to authorize the money will be obvious,” Rinaldi said. “If they come back
asking for $460 million again for Westhill, I’m a no vote.”
Freedman agreed.
“I don’t think they’ll get any votes if they come back at
$460 million,” Freedman said.
McMullen said his research shows that construction costs
have escalated 17 percent since the Westhill project was launched two years
ago, but the cost increased three times that.
“Why has our price gone up 50 percent?” McMullen said. “What
happened? Did the scope of the project increase? That’s something we should
know.”
Rinaldi said the key question is who will pay the
difference.
“The state is not saying they will increase their
contribution to meet these new costs, so the city is on the hook,” she said.
“It will come from the taxpayers of this city.”
Mahoney said that, after the mayor circumvented board
approval, trying to “engage the city in dialogue” may not be worth the effort.
“Maybe the city should just come back and ask us for an
additional authorization for the extra money, and we can vote it up or down,”
Mahoney said. “Then we’ll either have a Westhill project that moves forward, or
we’ll have a Westhill project that doesn’t move forward.”
Following property sale, new 42-bed rehabilitation hospital planned in Waterbury
A42-bed, 55,000-square-foot inpatient rehabilitation
hospital should soon be under construction in Waterbury following the sale
Monday of a roughly 4.5-acre building site to a Florida-based developer.
Catalyst Healthcare Real Estate, a Florida-based national
development and investment firm, bought a building site at the intersection of
Reidville Drive and Harpers Ferry Road in Waterbury’s East End, city officials
confirmed Monday.
State officials have already signed off on an application by
Pennsylvania-based PAM Health to operate a rehab hospital at this site.
Catalyst will build the property for lease to PAM Health, according to a city
official.
“We are happy to welcome another new business, Catalyst and
PAM Health, to Waterbury,” Waterbury Mayor Paul Pernerewski said Monday. “The
new acute care facility will enhance medical care for the people of Waterbury
and the region. Strategically located just off I-84, not only will it be a
brand-new facility offering 42 beds, but it will also provide 150 full-time and
50 part-time, good paying jobs. We look forward to their opening.”
The site was sold by members of the Napp family.
Ralph Napp, of Watertown, stopped by the site just after the
sale Monday. He said the 4.5-acre property had been in his family for more than
60 years, housing a concrete foundation business started by his father.
“It’s a good thing,” Napp said. “It will bring jobs.”
In December 2021, PAM Health and Waterbury Hospital filed a
joint application with the state Office of Health Strategy seeking regulatory
approval for the facility. The goal, according to the application, is to
provide rehabilitative services to patients leaving acute care hospitals in
western Connecticut. At the time, the project was estimated to cost $33
million.
The plan received state approval on Aug. 9, 2023, but
Waterbury Hospital backed out this past January. Weeks later, PAM Health sought
permission to move ahead independently. The Office of Health Strategy signed
off on the modified agreement in July.
PAM Health said it operates a network of more than 100
long-term acute care hospitals, physical medicine and rehabilitation hospitals,
as well as wound clinics, outpatient physical therapy sites and behavioral
health hospitals across 17 states.
According to the original application, the Waterbury
facility will provide specialized, “state-of-the-art” inpatient rehabilitation
care to people recovering from a wide array of injuries and illnesses, such as
stroke, traumatic brain injury, spinal cord injury, amputations, orthopedic
surgery, cardiac episodes and pulmonary conditions.
All rooms will be private. The facility will also have two
therapy gyms, an outdoor therapy area, daily living suite, activities room and
various therapy rooms.
“This is the good news we have been anticipating since our
first meeting with PAM Health and Catalyst in 2021,” Waterbury Economic
Development Director Joseph McGrath said. “This is not only gratifying from an
economic development perspective, but it will also provide the residents of
greater Waterbury with access to acute care rehabilitative services.”
