The options are on the table. After two nights of presentations, residents had the chance to hear and respond to the four development proposals for Academy School. While some proposals seemed to please residents more than others, Madisonites now have the opportunity to express their opinions on the proposals to the Board of Selectmen (BOS) as the board looks to narrow down the offerings.

After working with consultant Colliers International, the town was able to present four options in two public meetings held Feb. 12 and 13. If the four proposals, the vision of developers qualified to complete the project, are a predictor of what will come to the Academy site, downtown Madison is going to gain between 24 and 79 new housing units and possibly retain some community and recreational amenities. One-time proposed purchase payments top out at $1.2 million.

The Proposals

On Feb. 12 RAL Development Services and Greylock Property Group offered up their proposals and on Feb. 13, Women’s Institute-Hope Partnership and Dakota Partners, Inc., gave their proposals. According to Mark Sklenka of Colliers, potential developers were provided a packet including existing building information like the floor plan, conditions assessment, hazmat survey, and market reconnaissance study. In addition to the details of the building, the developers were also given a list of priorities distilled from the workshop meeting that included the need to maintain some level of open space and the playground, maintain the shell of the 1921 building, zoning regulations, and a desire for mixed use.

RAL Development Services

RAL, based in New York, New York, is a family owned and operated real estate development firm with a 38-year history of national and international developments. RAL founder, CEO, and president Robert Levine presented the proposal, a phased development of 44 units with a mix of condominiums, apartments, and townhouses.

Levine said he is a member of the community—his family has summered and spent weekends in town for 15 years—and he sees this as an opportunity to do something creative and create an upscale product.

“We really look at this as a partnership with the town, recognizing the mutual goals to ensure completion of this project and that is what we propose to do,” he said. “The most important thing as a resident that I could care about is the surety of the implementation of the plan as its put forth, completing the plan to achieve putting this property back on the tax rolls, which should be the goal for the municipality here, and recognizing the appropriate density.”

Levine said the project would include 20 loft units in Academy School and 24 town house units on the open space behind the school. He said he has no plans to eliminate any part of the Academy School, but said that the plan, as it stands, is mainly conceptual. He said his company is ready to put $33 million into this project, even with the cost required to remediate Academy School.

However, while residents have spoken in favor of a mixed-use proposal, Levine said mixed-use residential is not a good idea.

“We feel very strongly that it should only be residential and this way you can contain and control the character of what is developed,” he said. “Our experience with mixed-use properties and situations like this is really not positive…When you have community facilities mixed with trying to do a high-end residential product, it never works out and there are complaints and different issues that arise.”

Under the RAL proposal, the town retains no ownership of Academy and there would be no open space. The proposed purchase price is $150,000; the group proposed a revenue sharing option with the town for sales over $700 per square foot. The units, as suggested by Levine, would go for anywhere from $1.1- to $1.4 million.

Residents raised concerns about the price, the full loss of Academy, the loss of open space, the lack of details in the plan, and the density of development. One comment from residents came up multiple times: This is not the right fit for Madison.

Greylock Property Group

Greylock, based in Mystic, is a private real estate investment group that specializes in mixed-use and residential properties. Its proposal includes a phased-in, mixed-use development with 24 units of upscale housing as well as some affordable housing (in Madison, housing is considered affordable if its monthly cost does not exceed $2,165). For the Academy building, the proposal includes space for a community arts collaborative, co-working space, and an outdoor community space; the proposal also includes roof gardens. The proposed purchase price is $1.2 million.

Greylock partner Ken Navarro presented the proposal and said he believes there is a plan that can balance the town’s desire for tax revenue and the desire to keep open space and preserve Academy. He said mixed use has its challenges and that “mixed use takes courage and we have some courage.”

The proposal breaks out into three parts. Part A is the former Academy School. Navarro said they would take off the gym part of the building and turn the remaining structure into an arts collaborative, a potential co-working space, 15 reasonably priced apartments for workforce housing, and rooftop gardens for residents. For Academy, the plan is also to add something called Academy Commons, which would add public space with benches and sidewalks to connect to downtown.

Part B involves part of the space behind Academy. The 1.6 acres would be turned into a town green, connecting the current green and Academy Street and keeping the playground; the land would be deeded back to the town for community use.

Part C is the 24 units of upscale housing. Navarro said the homes would be historically sensitive in design and not too dense. Parking would not be on the street and sidewalks are planned to keep access open from the Senior Center to Academy School. Navarro said the units would likely go for anywhere from $500,000 to $800,000.

Residents were pleased with many elements of the proposal, particularly the green, the preservation of Academy, and the historically sensitive nature of the development, but some said the proposal seems a bit too good to be true from a financial feasibility perspective.

“We are not making any money on Part A or Part B, so we are hoping to make a little bit of money on Part C,” said Navarro. “I believe we can get a great green space for the town with some historically sensitive development that provides some property taxes and invigorates that area.”

Dakota Partners, Inc.

Based in Waltham, Massachusetts, Dakota Partners, Inc., specializes in housing and development, particularly historic renovation, projects across New England. Dakota proposed a phased development that includes 79 housing units—a mix of condominiums and townhouses to be built on the five acres available in the Academy parcel.

For the existing school building, the proposal includes ideas for 40 rental apartments, a café, community space, and some sort of fitness space. The rest of the units would be spread out over 39 luxury townhouses on the remained of the property. The proposed purchase price is $1 million.

The proposal is primarily residential because, according to Dakota’s Roberto Arista, residential development makes the most sense in the area and because of the condition of the school. Residents expressed concerns over the amount of housing and the lack of specificity for townhouse designs, but Arista said the proposal is very conceptual and more discussions can be had down the road.

“You have a beautiful little town here and we would not want to be the ones to come here and spoil it,” he said. “What we think is this is a sensitive project for this area. The school house is the school house—it’s going to stay exactly where it is and it’s going to look much better than it looks right now. In terms of the townhouses, we think that the style of the townhouses certainly fits the New England vernacular architecture.”

Dakota would own the parcel and early estimates suggest at full development the proposal could put $400,000 on the tax rolls per year, but the company did say it will need to secure some level of financing to complete the project. Additionally, the proposal includes a design for a septic system with excess space for the town to use in future.

“There is enough land area to build excess capacity, so we thought that we could give something back to the town by saying here is excess capacity for businesses in the downtown strip to connect if they want to expand,” he said.

Women’s Institute-Hope Partnership

The Middletown-based Women’s Institute-Hope Partnership combines the Women’s Institute for Housing and Economic Development, a mission driven non-profit development group, and HOPE Partnership, a community based shoreline organization dedicated to supporting local housing needs. The partnership proposed 29 one- and two-bedroom apartments to be built on the land behind Academy. The proposal indicated the development would be geared for a mixed-income community.

Women’s Institute Executive Director Betsy Crum said the proposal includes 13 apartments in the former school and 16 apartments spread out over four new buildings, all of which would be for rent. The proposal also includes space for community use and arts as well as open and recreational space, including tennis courts and gardens.

“If we were selected, we would want to spend some time in a community process,” she said. “Obviously we would need to associate more with the town and especially with all of you with the community space, but really around the details, too…We want to work with the residents of the town to identify the best use of that space. We don’t have a real distinct, pre-ordained concept of using that space except that we want to set it aside for the community use—not just the residents there.”

Crum said the proposal maintains the historic nature of Academy, restores and keeps the whole building, and keeps a great deal of open space. The apartment units are designed to be for various incomes, but there would be a push to have 60 percent of units be affordable based on the median household income in town.

“It would allow all kinds of folks to live on the Green and in Madison, she said. “It would serve market-rate people, recent retirees, millennials, and the local workforce.”

Residents seemed pleased with the proposal, particularly the level of development and the commitment to open space, but some had concerns about the project financing.

The partnership proposed a nominal fee ground lease option, meaning the partnership would own the improvements made to the property, but the town would maintain ownership of the land itself. As the group is a non-profit, it would look to lines of credit and state and federal tax credits and grants to support project financing.

What Happens Next

With the proposals in now open to the public, on Thursday, Feb. 22 at 7 p.m. at Polson Middle School, the town will hold a public information session to get feedback from residents and discuss the financial qualifications of the developers.

The rapid pace of the meetings had concerned some members of the board. At the initial Colliers presentation, Banisch said he would like to see the Academy School proposal end up on the May budget referendum ballot. Banisch said if possible it would be nice to get the question on the budget ballot because it would save the town money and move the process along.

“I think we have been talking about this for a year and a half, so if possible and we can get it onto the budget referendum, that would be great,” he said. “I am not going to push it so fast that we are missing any steps along the way, but I think what we are doing is we are giving people opportunities, while things are still fresh in their minds, to hear from the developers and then come and talk about it in the public meeting.”

According to the town website, it’s the intention of the BOS to narrow the proposals down to two options at the BOS meeting on Monday, Feb. 26 at 7 p.m. in Town Campus Room A, 8 Campus Drive.

The Process

In the past year, after the plan to have the Shoreline Arts Alliance (SAA) transform the school into a cultural arts center fell apart in summer 2016, the town ramped up the investigations into a new use for Academy School. The BOS hired an outside consulting firm, Fitzgerald & Halliday, Inc. (FHI), to conduct an online survey, stakeholder meetings, and public meetings to get a better sense of what residents want to see happen to the building and what possibilities are feasible.

The town, with the help of consultant Colliers International, began the process in early September 2017 with the request for qualifications (RFQ), allowing parties to express interest in the building and pass tests such as a credit check and development history, before moving on to the request for proposals (RFP), through which RFQ-approved parties could submit specific project proposals. The town received 10 RFQs on the building.

All 10 parties—including companies based locally to developers who have worked across the world—that responded to the RFQ were invited to submit an RFP, due on Dec. 18, 2017. The committee then had five proposals to put forward to the public.

All five proposals were presented to the BOS on Jan. 18. Marc Sklenka of Colliers International reviewed the proposals with the board as well as the process used up to this point. Sklenka said in picking a developer, the primary objective is to find someone with whom the town can partner on this project and not just turn the building over. He said whatever happens to Academy needs to benefit the taxpayers and developers have been made aware that residents will have a say in this process.

“Having options made available to residents is going to be important because we want to hear from the town on what they think makes the most sense,” he said. “We want to let people have a voice in the process.”