In the first vote taken on the long path to final approval, the 1.6 million-square-foot retail center proposed for Stroudwater Street
won the backing of the Westbrook Planning Board Tuesday night.
The Planning Board voted 6-1 to recommend the City Council amend the comprehensive plan in order to allow for the project. The major changes that need to be made to the plan are a reduction in the minimum allowable open space, an increase in the maximum allowable density and a change in the role of retail at the site, from a support use to a dominant one.
Anna Wrobel was the one board member to vote against recommending the comprehensive plan changes to the City Council.
The vote Tuesday was the first one taken by elected officials since property owner Jason Snyder and his team of developers and designers came to the city in February with his proposal to build the state’s largest retail, restaurant and recreation center between Stroudwater Street and the Westbrook Arterial. Since then, the Planning Board has held public hearings and met regularly to discuss the project.
From here, the City Council will have to decide whether to make the changes to the comprehensive plan. After that, the Planning Board and the City Council will go through the same process to approve the contract zone. If the City Council gives both approvals, the developer will return to the Planning Board with specific details of what the project will look like.
“They’re taking their time reviewing the project and going through the process,” Snyder said Wednesday. He referred to his public relations consultant, Dennis Bailey, for further comment regarding the meeting. Bailey declined to comment because he said he was not there.
Snyder and his team have described the 60-plus-acres project as a destination, with amenities such as skating rinks, a farmers market and outdoor recreation areas, along with restaurants and high-end retail stores, like Nordstrom and Bloomingdale’s. They’ve said the project would add $5 million to the local tax base and provide some 4,000 permanent jobs.
The Planning Board vote followed a public hearing, which nearly filled Room 114 at Westbrook High School. The majority of residents who spoke said they supported the project and the changes that would need to be made to the comprehensive plan. They said it was a rare opportunity for the city that needed to be fully explored before a decision could be made.
Those opposed, many of whom are abutters to the site of the proposed project, said the comprehensive plan calls for the preservation of Stroudwater Street’s unique character – something that would be lost by increasing allowable density and decreasing required open space. Though they said they understood Snyder’s land would be developed, they believed the business and office uses that the comprehensive plan calls for are more appropriate.
Both sides agree that the project will change Westbrook, but they’re at odds as to whether it will be a positive or negative change.
State Rep. Ann Peoples, who said she saw the latest comprehensive plan through the whole process of being formulated and adopted in 2000, reminded the Planning Board that it is a living document, meant to be altered.
“It was our best crystal ball gaze,” said Peoples, who had hoped the area would have been filled with Idexx-like businesses, but sees “that’s not happening.”
Considering the pressure to develop in the area, she said, Snyder’s project is a good alternative.
“We need to get ahead of the curve and decide what makes sense for that land,” she said.
Elizabeth Gattine, who lives with her husband, City Councilor Drew Gattine, across Stroudwater Street from Snyder’s property, said her greatest concern is how the project will affect the new middle school being built off Stroundwater Street.
“I’m not happy about building a $30 million school mall-side,” she said.
Gattine also read from the comprehensive plan’s description of the Stroudwater Street area, which is described as “the most dramatic rural landscape in the city” that serves as a “visual surprise” for drivers coming to and from Portland.
Still reeling from the stigma of being “just another mill town,” Gattine said, Westbrook should stop selling itself short.
“I don’t want us viewed as just another mall town, either,” she said.
Others, however, said the rural character of Stroudwater Street is doomed anyway – and this project, with its potential boon to the city’s tax base, is too good to give up.
John Searles, who owns Town and Country Motors on Stroudwater Street, said he believes his and other local businesses could greatly benefit from the project.
“We’ve got a few cows out there that could graze somewhere else,” he said. “Businesses are struggling downtown.”
Though some residents who spoke at the meeting said the jobs that would be created are low paying and not the type of jobs Westbrook wants, John Gallagher, executive director of Westbrook Housing, said he knows a lot of people in the city who are in need of employment and would like to fill those positions.
“This is a real opportunity for this community,” he said. “I’d hate to see it get passed by.”
Mike White, president of White Brothers Construction, said he recognized there were both upsides and downsides to the project, but that it “should get the airing it deserves” before a decision is made.
A former mayor, Ken LeFevbre, echoed Gallagher and White as he spoke in favor of the project.
“A job is a job. People need jobs today,” he said. “Let it be fully vetted.”
After the public hearing, the discussion by the Planning Board was minimal before its vote. It did, however, decide not to make specific recommendations to the City Council regarding the reduction of open space, which would go from 30 percent to 20 percent, or increasing in allowable density, which would double.
Planning Board member Paul Emery said he believed that given the number of times the project would be filtered through both the board and the City Council, details did not need to be voted on at that point.
Planning Board member Rene Daniel agreed.
“Let it go forward,” he said.
Stroudwater project wins first round
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