Greenville officials to market Spruce Street business space

GREENVILLE — Over the last few months, the Greenville Select Board has been discussing the Greenville Business Center on Spruce Street and the possibility of development on the parcel after several parties expressed interest.

Currently Glacial Wear creates its fur and leather products via a lease agreement on the municipal property. In recent months other inquiries about the  3.8 available acres have been made and board members asked Town Manager Mike Roy to find all the information he could on the site. After hearing from him during an Aug. 16 meeting, the town manager was authorized to start marketing the available land  through leases.

Roy provided the select board with a map and information on how the Greenville Business Center may be subdivided. He said he was asked to find out more information on the land “and I came up on a dead end quite honestly.”

“I know the town acquired it and it was back in 1988 I believe, and it was revised in 1992,” the town manager said. He said the site originally totaled 8.62 acres – Roy believes the acquisition was made in part for snow dumping — and the town later sold a few lots and kept a right of way. 

“We haven’t had any major capital plan,” Roy said. He said Greenville’s comprehensive plan discusses building out the area but the document does not go into great detail.

He said there is enough land to subdivide to allow for rentals which would include space for parking. The 3.8 acres has about 168,000 square feet available. The select board previously agreed that the lease rate would be 25 cents per square foot.

“I would recommend putting it out there as far as advertising this,” Roy said. “This comprehensive plan suggests adjusting the market strategy as appropriate through the town’s web page and the Piscataquis County Economic Development Council and other state agencies.”

He said if an interested party was seeking either a big or small building then the town would work to help tailor the lot to their needs. There are no restrictions on how many ways the Greenville Business Center could be utilized, such as four or five different buildings with a separate occupant in each.

A contractor who had expressed interest in the site for a structure had decided not to pursue anything at the time but conversations with someone looking to bring a nationwide veterans radio station to the community continue. Roy mentioned two days prior someone came in and asked about buying the entire property, 

The land would need to be surveyed and any formal lease agreements would be negotiated and brought before the select board.

In other business, the select board met with Janet Chasse of the Moosehead Caring for Kids Foundation to discuss a potential after-school care program for pre-kindergarten students. 

The board ended up passing a motion to proceed in developing a formal contract with the foundation to create a program for this age group. The Moosehead Caring for Kids Foundation would cover all incurred costs not met by tuition and the group will work out all details and responsibilities between it and the Greenville Recreation Department. 

Chase said currently a daycare facility is housed at the snowmobile club with about 20 preschool and younger children attending daily from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. A group of 20 children ages 5 and up take part in an after-school program through the recreation department at the Greenville Consolidated School once classes conclude. 

She said about 50 children are enrolled counting part-time attendees and there is a waiting list of 10.

“The 4-year-olds are left out in the cold as far as school-age childcare,” Chasse said, as this age group is not permitted to be in an after-school program with older children.

“When the bell rings at 2:30 p.m., legally they can’t be there in childcare in that building,” she said, even as the pre-K students go to school all day long on campus.

“We can’t hold the space for them up at the daycare to come back to after school,” Chasse said. She said there would be seven pre-K students in 2023-24 and the families of five have expressed interest in the after-school program and the two others may start in the middle of the school year.

The state has different and more rules for childcare facilities compared to rec department offerings and the pre-K after-school program would fall under the auspices of a rec department club under the proposal.

“The easiest rules to follow are the recreation department,” Chasse said.

She said the plan would be to offer pre-K child care from 2:30-5 p.m. five days a week. The students would be picked up, have a snack in the cafeteria, and then would play outside most days. Chasse said families would pay $15 a day to fund the staff member, supplies, and food.

“Otherwise these parents, who work at the hospital or with AMC or with the water company will not have childcare for their 4-year-olds after school,” she said.

“The town won’t have any cost,” Chasse said as the foundation board would cover any differences such as with payroll tax.

Roy — who said he sees the need for such a program — estimated a timeframe of 452 hours of childcare across the school year, coming to $9,312 in wages at $20 an hour plus $1,546 for insurance and payroll tax for a cost of $10,859 for one employee. With two employees this would be doubled.

“There’s no budget in the rec department for this at all,” he said, any more town expenditures would need to be approved at a special town meeting.

Chasse said the program would be a stopgap until the new childcare facility is constructed on the school property.

Earlier this year $1.5 million in federal funding was secured with the passage of the 2023 omnibus spending bill to build a facility on the Greenville Consolidated School campus to house a childcare center, pre-K classrooms, and community recreation center.

Chasse said she believes ground could be broken next spring and the building could be operational in the fall of 2024, but Roy said this schedule may be too tight.