LEWISTON — The city is seeking to extend the required timeline to spend $500,000 from a federal grant meant to assist with environmental cleanup work at Bates Mill No. 5.

Potential redeveloper Tom Platz, who is about halfway through a “final” five-year purchase and sale agreement with the city to buy the mill, said the cleanup work is the first thing that needs to occur before redevelopment efforts can move ahead.

According to Lincoln Jeffers, director of economic and community development, the city issued a request for proposals for the work this year, extending the “period of performance” for the grant until Sept. 30.

The city is essentially looking to restart the bid process in hopes of making the funding accumulated so far go further.

“There was significant interest in the work from contractors, but because of some of the parameters and timelines in the bid packet, only one bid was received, and it was over the budget allocated for the work,” he said. “We are in the process of extending the grant timeline in order to create a more competitive bidding environment.”

The work will include removing PCBs — a group of artificial chemicals that were widely used in electrical equipment — in the concrete floor of the generation room, as well as interior asbestos abatement.

Under the terms of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Brownfields grant, the city must own the property while the work takes place.

The city also received $1 million in “Community Directed Spending” as part of a federal bill supported by U.S. Sens. Susan Collins and Angus King and U.S. Rep. Jared Golden last year. Jeffers said those funds don’t have to be spent until 2030.

When the funding was announced last year, Jeffers told the Sun Journal that the $1 million would supplement funding the city had already secured, but would not see them all the way through to the end of the project.

According to City Administrator Heather Hunter, an additional $1 million was allocated to the project from the city’s “rainy day fund” this year, but “the project bid came in well over budget so we’re evaluating funding sources and cost savings.”

The Bates Mill cleanup funding has previously been deferred and is only a part of a $5 million project that officials have sought to fund with additional federal dollars.

Since the city took over the property in 1992, there have been decades of discussion over whether to demolish or redevelop the property. City officials have said that regardless of whether the mill is redeveloped or demolished, the environmental issues in the mill need to be mitigated.

The City Council approved the five-year agreement with Platz in 2021. Platz has had success in redeveloping other buildings on the Bates Mill campus, but the 350,000-square-foot Mill 5 has proved difficult.

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