Big changes are in store for one of the most visible spots in downtown Shelton.
The family who owns a mixed-use property leveled by a January 2014 fire will be seeking approval from the city’s land use agencies to replace it with a five-story building with three floors of apartments and two floors of retail and commercial space.
And the city itself will soon begin negotiations to buy up nearby space with a view to “controlling” development in the area — including the possible relocation of City Hall.
City officials discussed the redevelopment plans Friday (May 29) at a meeting of the Planning and Zoning Commission’s Downtown Subcommittee, which has been working with a landscape architect on conceptual plans for the area bounded by White and Center streets and Howe and Coram Avenues.
Also in attendance were Mayor Mark Lauretti, state Rep. Jason Perillo, and Eric McPherson and Stanley Kudej, Aldermen whose First Ward covers downtown.
Matto Property
A Jan. 6, 2014 fire leveled a 19th-century wood frame building with retail space on its ground floor and about 30 people living in apartments on its upper floors.
The property sits much as it did about a month after the blaze, with a chain-link fence cordoning off a pit where the building’s basement used to be, full of dirt, glass, bricks, and cement chunks.
The property is owned by Ralph Matto, a local builder.
Matto’s son, Joseph, an architect, has been drawing up plans for a new building to replace the old one, and on Friday gave the downtown subcommittee a look at his latest drawings.
In an interview Monday, Joseph Matto said he anticipates putting in a formal application to the PZC this summer.
Matto said the owners of the two restaurants — Liquid Lunch and Joy Lee — are interested in returning.
Liquid Lunch plans on rebranding as GROW, a farm-to-table restaurant. A June 8 “preview party” will take place at nearby Bar 140, at 140 Center St., at 7 p.m., according to a Facebook post Monday by owner Michele Bialek.
They’ve also started a GoFundme page seeking help with the transition.
The footprint of those two restaurants would be replicated exactly, with a 16-foot “arcade” walkway between them, in the new building.
Matto said Monday that other tenants have expressed an interest in returning to the new building, including Petal Pushers, a florist.
The status of Howe Convenient, a delightfully named convenience store formerly at the corner of Howe and Bridge streets, isn’t as clear.
“We’re debating whether to put a convenience store or something like a Starbucks,” Matto said.
City Plans
Meanwhile, the city is in the process of re-envisioning many properties it owns in the immediate area, including the Echo Hose firehouse, the parking lot between the U.S. Post Office and the Matto property, and Probate Court offices on White Street.
The PZC’s downtown subcommittee has been working with Jason Williams, a landscape architect at Cheshire-based Milone & MacBroom, to look at different conceptual plans for the area.
On Friday Williams showed the subcommittee a handful of rough outlines for a “forward-thinking, Blueback Square-type” development that included space for a new “government center” on Coram Avenue.
He also showed the committee two different “perspectives” showing existing conditions at a couple of downtown intersections and what they might look like with new buildings.
Article continues after documents.
The plans are far from finalized — the subcommittee has been fine-tuning them for months, and Williams will return with further refinements at a meeting tentatively scheduled for June 12.
Mayor Mark Lauretti said during the meeting that the city “is going to start to enter into discussions with all the property owners for the purchase of the properties.”
But that doesn’t mean the City of Shelton is getting into the real estate development business, he said, “because we’re not.”
“The intent is to control the plan and design,” Lauretti said. ‘We would offer the properties to someone else at some point in time.”
Matto said his family has agreed to give up about 20 feet of its property along Bridge Street so the city can widen it, extend it through to Coram Avenue, and put diagonal parking spaces there.
What the city would give up in return hasn’t been ironed out yet, he said.
“The biggest issue is the town needs to decide what they want to do on those other adjacent properties, and then syncing up the two timelines,” Matto said.
John Anglace, the president of the Board of Aldermen, commended the Matto family for working with the city as their plans have moved forward.
“They’ve been just tremendous,” Anglace siad. “They’ve come up with a fantastic plan and everybody’s buying into it.”
At the same time, he said the relocation of City Hall to the area is “not a given.”
City Hall is currently on Hill Street between Coram and Prospect avenues, in a building that previously served as a school.
“Quite frankly, I have some concerns about putting a City Hall downtown, versus in the center of town,” Anglace said.
The Echo Hose Hook & Ladder firehouse, which sits on Coram Avenue near White Street, would have to be relocated, for instance.
“I’m not hung up on it,” he went on, adding later: “Everything’s a balance. In this business you can’t get hung up on your personal opinions. You’ve got to wait for the facts to come out and you’ve got to consider them and weigh them.”
Lauretti said Tuesday that the possible relocation of City Hall is “a topic for discussion.”
It makes sense to have that discussion now, the mayor said, with the city already owning a number of properties downtown and the Matto property being redeveloped anew.
“If there’s anything that I’ve learned about issues like this is that they have to be planned for,” Lauretti said. “Now is the perfect time, when people want to invest or continue to invest in downtown.”
A possible move was broached about 20 years ago, Lauretti said, when developer Robert Scinto drew up a proposal.
City Hall wasn’t moved then — but the city has continued to grow since.
“Twenty-four years later, we might be ready to do this,” Lauretti said. “I think that it could enhance downtown development, although we’ve got four real nice projects on the table right now that most municipalities would give their eye teeth for.”
