Jasmine Wright
Olson Drive, in August 2024.
ANSONIA – Two Aldermen asked the city why it continues to be involved in the remediation of Olson Drive, more than two years after it was sold to a private developer.
During the monthly meeting of the Board of Aldermen on Jan. 12, the board voted to accept a series of state grants, including a $3.8 million grant for assessment and remediation on Olson Drive. Before voting, however, Alderman Bob Knott asked why public money is still going to the private project.
“This Olson Drive thing is kind of rubbing me wrong. We sold the property and I was all in favor of that,” Knott said.
However, he said, he wasn’t sure why the remediation was receiving public funds. He asked economic development director Sheila O’Malley why that is.
“Now that it’s sold, we got the grant — not ‘we,’ you did — got the grant for the cleanup of the property. Most of the material that they dug up is still on-site, and now we’re going to go to bid for laying the foundation for the field,” Knott said. “I just don’t understand, are we going to build the whole thing and hand the guy the key when we’re done with it?”
O’Malley said that, although the developer had bought the property “as-is,” the city was able to secure grant money from the state to help the developer along. She said grant money will only be used for assessment and remediation, and not the construction of the planned private sports complex on the site.
The city sold the land at 31 – 165 Olson Drive to Bridgeport developer The Primrose Companies in 2022 for $510,000, in a deal that also included seventeen years of tax breaks and a promise from the developers to rebuild the Ansonia animal shelter.
In the time since then, though, plans have changed.
Remediation of the site – which used to be home to a federally-subsidized apartment complex – has been costlier than anticipated, due to the discovery of widespread contamination after the sale. The city has been helping the developer in cleaning up the contamination using state grant money.
The promise to rebuild the animal shelter was also revised, with the developers now on the hook for just part of the reconstruction.
Knott said he didn’t understand why the developer didn’t investigate the amount of contamination before purchasing the property.
Before voting to accept the grant funds, Alderwoman Bobbi Tar asked whether any city money was going toward the project.
“Just to clarify again, nothing is coming out of the city or the taxpayers for anything to do with Olson Drive?” Tar asked.
O’Malley said that the entire $3.8 million comes from the state. That’s still taxpayer money – but not exclusively from Ansonia city taxes.
The Primrose Companies is expected to invest $16.4 million into development on the property, according to the original grant award.
