The complex is in a state-designated Pine Tree Zone.

WILTON – A response team is seeking an experienced developer to “turn potential into profit” with 291,000 square feet of multi-use space.

A development group envisions the G.H. Bass & Co. complex on Weld Street to become the Franklin Regional Business and Technology Center.

The Wilton Development Corp., a nonprofit, private economic development group, held a press conference Friday to launch a campaign to find a master developer for the existing Phillips-Van Heusen G.H. Bass & Co. complex on Weld Street.

The corporation has formed a response team working with Alison Hagerstrom, executive director of Greater Franklin Development Corp., Sarah Doscinski of the Androscoggin Valley Council of Governments and state Department of Economic and Community Development and Wilton Town Manager Peter Nielsen on a proposal for the project.

G.H. Bass & Co. announced before Christmas that approximately 120 employees, about 80 of them full-time, would lose their jobs when it closed the distribution center by the end of May.

The company offered to sell the complex to the town at a minimum price similar to what it did when it sold the multi-story Bass building on Main Street for $1.

Businessman Randy Cousineau of Strong was the lone bidder as developer and has since turned the Main Street Bass Building now known as Wilson/Bass Properties into an attractive site with a suite of offices leased to the Franklin County Head Start and Child Care program and several spaces leased to other businesses including a restaurant.

Selectmen, as they did back in 1998, transferred the offer to the Wilton Development Corp. to find a new owner/developer to attract business to Wilton and create much needed jobs.

Negotiations between Wilton Development Corp. and Phillips-Van Heusen have not been finalized, Gilbert Riley, president of the development corporation said. The corporation has sent in a response to the offer and the company has received it.

“There’s no deal yet,” Riley said.

The response team has put together a packet of information that would be sent to interested people in order to find a top-caliber developer.

The complex has eight-units, seven of them attached, that could be divided into different sections for more than one company.

The complex is a state Pine Tree Zone designated site for economic development. Wilton voters will consider adoption of the zone in June.

Wilton Development Corp. and the state are willing to work with a developer to help attract business to the complex.

Currently, ICT Inc., an inbound call center, leases a two-story space.

Advertisements seeking a master developer were scheduled to appear Friday in a number of publications including Mainebiz and area newspapers.

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