City Wants To Acquire Former Ansonia Copper & Brass Property

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A Google image showing 75 Liberty St. in Ansonia.

ANSONIA — City government is exploring the possibility of purchasing the dilapidated Ansonia Copper & Brass property downtown, which in its heyday served as a bustling hub of manufacturing in the Valley.

The Board of Aldermen during a virtual meeting Tuesday (March 9) voted in favor of the city putting the sprawling, but heavily blighted and heavily in debt, 60-acre site up for a tax sale. 

Currently, there is some $2.5 million owed in back taxes on the property, according to Ansonia Corporation Counsel John Marini. 

The city is considering acquiring the property itself, leveraging the back taxes as a purchase price, essentially.

The city held a tax auction on the property a couple years back but received only one bid for $110,000, which was rejected by the Aldermen.

In 2016, city officials said developers were interested in the property, perhaps as a retail project or a convention center, but nothing materialized.

The city has tried various ways to get the property redeveloped, including working with a former property owner.

Marini, along with Mayor David Cassetti and Economic Development Director Sheila O’Malley, said the city must intervene and try to acquire the long-fallow property. 

They said a developer won’t come in and pay the back taxes, along with at least $10 million or more in anticipated environmental clean-up costs. 

With the city as the potential owner, however, O’Malley said the city can qualify for state and federal funding and work hand in hand with a developer or developers to make something great happen at the iconic property situated alongside the Naugatuck River.

The city needs to put skin in the game to make something happen,” Marini said. Ansonia Copper & Brass is a key parcel. No developer can do this alone. There needs to be city involvement. Acquisition of the property would be in lieu of taxes, and would pave the way for the city to bring back jobs and put the property back on tax rolls. This property will likely languish for another decade if we do nothing.”

Marini said the Aldermen’s approval allows the city to move forward with a tax sale. That means the tax collector would place the property up for auction and enter a bid representing the full tax balance.

This would allow the city to take possession of the property in lieu of collecting the taxes owed,” Marini said. The property owner would have an opportunity to redeem the property by paying the full amount of the taxes owed, inclusive of interest. If full payment is not made by the time the statutory redemption period expires, then title to the property would transfer to the city.”

Several Aldermen, including Alderwoman Diane Stroman and Aldermen Bill Phipps and Joe Jeanette, voted against the move, and expressed concern for the city’s liability in acquiring such a blighted and dilapidated parcel.

O’Malley said liability is a major concern which is why she said the city has successfully entered” into the state’s Abandoned Brownfield Cleanup Program for the city’s protection, a move recommended by the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection. O’Malley said the city would also work alongside the federal Environmental Protection Agency.

Alderman Anthony Mammone said he doesn’t expect any developers to be knocking down the city’s doors anytime soon and handing us a big check,” and believes without city intervention, the property will sit fallow for another several decades.

Ansonia Copper & Brass sat adjacent to the Naugatuck River and served as a thriving manufacturing hub for Ansonia and the surrounding Valley towns for more than 150 years. The site originally comprised more than 700,000-square feet of factory buildings spanning Liberty Street and was once the city’s largest taxpayer before the last portion of it closed the day before Thanksgiving Day 2013.

Established in the mid-1800s, the company once employed some 10,000 workers on three shifts.

The property’s address is 75 Liberty St. and 7 Riverside Drive.

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