After a public auction yielded no offers, the family listed the property.
By Gail Geraghty
Staff Writer

NORWAY – The Growth Council of Oxford Hills is buying the C.B. Cummings and Sons dowel mill property in downtown Norway.

Mill owners Brad and Steve Cummings have agreed to sell the mill to the council for $100,000, a fourth of the earlier asking price of $400,000.

The first of several public “brainstorming sessions” on the future of the mill will be held at 7 p.m. Thursday at Norway Town Hall. “At this point it’s an open game” in what use will be made of the property, said Barb Olson, the growth council’s vice president.

C.B. Cummings President Brad Cummings was philosophical when the sale was announced at a Wednesday press briefing at the Water Street mill.

“It allows us to close the books on the corporation, and that sits very well with me,” Cummings said. The Cummings family closed the mill a year ago, and has since sold all its timber and other real estate holding except the mill property.

After a public auction yielded no offers, the family listed the property in April with The Dunham Group of Portland, one of the state’s largest marketers of industrial real estate.

After six months on the market and no offers, the family let the contract expire and approached the growth council for help.

Western Maine Development, the growth council’s real estate arm, is financing the sale, which will become final by mid-December.

By that time, the growth council hopes to complete some preliminary survey work at the 4.5-acre site. The property, which had been continuously operated by the Cummings family as a woodworking mill for 142 years, has 11 buildings of all sizes and ages, including an office, machine shop, dowel mill, planer room, sawmill, warehouse and cinder block mill.

Norway selectmen agreed earlier this month to sponsor, on behalf of Western Maine Development, an application for a $400,000 downtown revitalization grant under the state’s Community Development Block Grant Program.

A CDBG grant in the same amount was awarded to the town four years ago, after the growth council bought a blighted two-story commercial building at 443 Main St. for $95,000.

The town used the grant to buy the property from the growth council. The town then created a large municipal parking lot on the acre of land in back, and worked with the Fare Share Coop to restore the building.

The application deadline for the CDBG grant is in mid-January, just over two months from now.

The growth council is also asking for grant help from the federal Rural Development program to create a master plan for the site.

“We’ve got some great local developers that have shown some interest in the site,” said Growth Council President Brett Doney. But he added, “I’m sure there are some other great ideas for the site from people who haven’t yet come forward.”

Norway Selectman George Tibbetts, who worked at the mill for 48 years, said the board has made it clear the town is not willing at this point to make any financial commitment to the project.

“It’s too early in the game,” he said. “If they come up with a good plan, I’m sure the town will go along with it.”

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