Good news
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Back to Chickahominy with you, boys
The Pecora Brothers building company was in talks to purchase the property. They were in contract with the land use company affiliated with developer Chris Franco, which owns the site.
Attorney James Moriarty, representing the owners of the site where a five-story building at 515 East Putnam Ave. was proposed, sent a letter to town Planning Department late last week. In it, he requested the application be withdrawn from consideration by the Planning & Zoning Commission.
On Tuesday, Franco wrote in an email, “My company is the owner, and the contract to sell the property has been terminated. The buyer did not close last week, as was required by the contract, and we have terminated the transaction. We have also formally withdrawn the buyers’ application for the project, since they are no longer contract buyers and we have no interest in continuing their project.”
Chris Franco was never the bad guy here. As I wrote last December, he tried for several years to develop the property in what many ordinary citizens (that would include me), and most of the town boards that consider these things, considered to be a pretty good plan that would have preserved the streetscape and still have allowed a profit. Our Wetlands board, in particular, objected and, frustrated, Franco gave up and entered into a contract with the Pecora brothers so that they could try their hand. Franco did not know that the Pecora plan would include 86 apartments and a massive edifice along Route One, but he had no say in the matter; it was the Peoras’ deal.
But now the boys have given up, so the purchase contract is ended, and Franco is free to try again, either by reapplying on his own behalf — I hope he does — or finding another buyer. Either way, I don’t think we’ll see another proposal for something anything like Pecora Towers again.
