NORWAY – The town will hold a special meeting Jan. 13 to consider designating a “slum and blighted” area around the former C.B. Cummings & Son mill for redevelopment.

The designation is intended to make the town eligible for grant money that would be used for improvements on and around the old wood-turning manufacturing plant, Town Manager David Holt said Wednesday.

According to a map provided by Holt, the area in question is bounded by Main Street, Water Street, Bridge Street, Pikes Hill, Orchard Street, Greenleaf Avenue and the Pennesseewassee Stream.

The map may be altered or rejected at the town meeting, Holt said.

A legislative body, or the voters of Norway, has to approve the “slum and blighted” designation in order to make the town eligible for a Community Block Development Grant. Holt said the process will be similar to one followed when the Fare Share Co-Op property was improved a few years ago.

If voters do not approve the designation for the former mill site and surrounding area, he said, a second attempt at securing Community Development Block Grant money for the project may fail.

“Some people confuse (slum and blight) with condemnation, but it’s not,” Holt noted. He said many buildings in the proposed area are very nice. “It’s just a designation that we use so we can spend federal money in those areas and hopefully make it better.”

The Maine Office of Community Development in February rejected an application for a $400,000 Community Development Block Grant that would have paid for some of the mill redevelopment. Holt said Wednesday that he thought part of the problem was that the application did not effectively tie the mill site into a larger part of the downtown area.

He said he hopes the approach of designating a larger “blighted” area will help this time around. This year, the grant is valued at $500,000. The grant application is due Jan. 15, Holt said.

The town meeting will be held at 7 p.m. at the town office.