[I] Started a project about three years ago now to do what I could to jump start the revitalization of downtown Franklin using a vision that makes sense economically and environmentally and I am hear today taking on one of the more difficult challenges or tasks that comes about when you’re trying to enact change. Change doesn’t always come easy, some folks feel threatened by change, or are benefitting from the status quo. Other folks are just fearful and prefer to keep things the way they are.
So unfortunately sometimes some difficult tasks come about. I am asking for some help today to take some photo documentation of the existing baseline conditions in Franklin, in particular reference to some the buildings, that many of them in fact downtown which are not in compliance with different sate and local codes. Many of the buildings as you look around you’ll notice are boarded up, they have broken glass, they have graffiti, missing architectural details, peeling paint, and lots of other general building violations.
So by design and by intent I took some risk, quite a bit of risk actually, to do what I could individually to acquire as many of the blighted buildings in downtown Franklin as I could with the concept of assembling those to obtain critical mass and then to go back and work with cooperation with the local government, different funding agencies throughout the state of New Hampshire, and the federal government to put together a plan to do it in a way that makes sense and a timeline that makes sense with good design.
Somehow in that process, there has been a misunderstanding with the folks across the street here at city hall where they misconstrued my ambitions, and were under the false impression that I was going to acquire the buildings and then pull a check book out of my back pocket here and find a way to magically to do it overnight with my own expenditures which is a false impression
I am just a catalyst or placeholder looking to acquire these building and work with other folks who share the same vision. In that regard we are making tremendous strides and success, unfortunately one building in particular right across the street from where we are sitting today, the city of Franklin effectively started a lawsuit against on me the very day I purchased it from a foreclosure auction.
And, we, as of today, have not been able to reach any middle ground in terms of what is a fair time line to fix this property up and what really needs to be done
So today I am looking for some help from you to document the progress we have done the good faith we have shown, talk a little bit about the design ideas that were put forth by the american institute of architecture, so you some of the design for the coffeehouse, there brewery, the restaurant the quality apartments, the sustainable building features, with the rainwater catchment, and a bunch of other things to conserve energy, and tighten up our thermal envelope and make good use of rooftop in terms of rainwater catchment, and also having a nice place to enjoy and to actually grow vegetables and make up for the lack of a yard.
So today I need to go about town and show kind of the blight that exists throughout the whole downtown. Not just in my buildings but in other properties, as well as other properties, even some owned by the city of Franklin. I think when we are done today, you will realize that this building across the street is not unique in its condition, its fairly close to being in line a percentage of buildings in downtown Franklin. If you get to heart of the matter, the reason they are not fixed up and fully engaged and occupied right now is that that train left the station along time ago. These buildings have been failing apart a little bit year by year since the last the last factory shut down, since I-93 came to town, since the box stores where built, people started buying things over the internet using their computers.
So the downtown has slowly slipped into a little bit of an abyss, and as it crumbles year by year, it becomes a little bit unfair to ask a new property owner to immediately reverse financially the condition of the building that took 50 years to get to its current state. We’ve got to put together a plan that doesn’t force the owners more money in a short period of time than the building can generate in revenue which will result in a forced bankruptcy and make the problem that much better.
So thats what we are trying to do today and hopefully when we are done we will have a baseline condition and as we meet without the years and hopefully within 5 years or so we can do this again and we can have a whole new set of building conditions.