LEWISTON – A complete Bates Mill exit strategy is about three weeks away, City Administrator Jim Bennett said Thursday.

Bennett promised the Lewiston Mill Redevelopment Corporation board that it would be briefed on the final deal before it is made public. Bennett said the city and developer Tom Platz are down to the last four or five items.

“Let’s just say that I’m extremely optimistic that this exit strategy can work,” Bennett said. “An enormous amount of work has gone into this so far, and I feel very good about it.”

Then, Bennett and the board went behind closed doors to discuss the negotiations to date in executive session. Bennett said Lewiston city councilors will get a similar closed door briefing after their meeting Tuesday.

Bennett did give an outline of his goals and the problems facing Lewiston before the executive session. The mill complex continues to cost the city between $425,000 and $1 million each year in redevelopment costs.

“We will get our money back, in the form of jobs and tax revenues,” Bennett said. “But the problem is that the way things are right now, we have to put our money in up front.”

The Bates Mill has other hidden costs as well, including parking costs and possible environmental cleanup costs. Those could amount to millions of dollars, and the city has little control over when that money would be spent.

An exit strategy would spread that investment out over years, Bennett said. That would give the city more control over when it spends its money.

“It will also align those expenditures with new revenues from the development of the project itself,” Bennett said. “The money to pay for the project would come in as the new costs come up.”

Negotiations began last fall, with Bennett telling councilors the city needs to focus on developing Mill No. 5 and get out of the rest. The city took over ownership of the property in 1992 and has been renovating mill buildings and selling them to Platz Associates since then.

Bennett said he hopes to brief the mill board and the City Council in about three weeks and release details of his exit strategy to the public. Councilors would be scheduled to discuss the plan in an informal workshop days later.

Bennett said he hopes to have councilors vote on a deal with Platz before the end of the year.

staylor@sunjournal.com

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