City council considering property purchase for Colonial expansion

The City of Laconia will discuss purchasing the back two-thirds of the Laconia Antique Center at 601 Main St. downtown Monday evening at their regular meeting. State Rep. Charlie St. Clair, pictured, owns the building. (Photo by Gabriel Perry, Laconia Daily Sun)

The city council held a public hearing Monday (Feb. 26) at their regular meeting to discuss details of the potential purchase of 601 Main St. downtown, directly adjacent to the Colonial Theatre, for a potential expansion.

The building, currently owned by state Rep. Charlie St. Clair, would be purchased by the city in conjunction with an unnamed restaurateur, who would open a business in the front third of the building, where St. Clair’s Laconia Antique Center stands, leaving two-thirds available for the city’s use.

The city may look to subdivide their portion of the property to provide more space for the Colonial Theatre.

“We have the potential to purchase the antique center,” City Manager Kirk Beattie said Friday. “We’d be looking to purchase the back two-thirds of it.”

That back two-thirds includes the taller, two-story section of the building nearest City Hall. The purchase price is estimated to be $800,000 for that portion, according to documents prepared for the council meeting. The city’s purchase would be funded by Invest NH dollars, a program which delegates funds to municipalities from the state’s $100 million American Rescue Plan Act State and Local Fiscal Recovery Funds allocation.

“At some point we would like to integrate it to the Colonial Theatre for space,” Beattie said, noting the development would further encourage growth  downtown. “We’ll end up working with attorneys to turn that one piece of property into two pieces.”

A private restaurateur would purchase the front third of the building with an entrance on Main Street. City officials did not identify the restaurateur, but noted the person may make a public presentation in the weeks to come.

“We’ve been having discussion for a couple of months about this,” Beattie said, adding that city council talks regarding the potential deal have occurred in closed-session only, as is standard in cases of real estate transactions.

“I think that it’s an opportunity to grow the downtown,” Beattie said. “It’s also an opportunity to support the growth of the theater — it’s got a good footprint now but it needs some growth size-wise.”

Mayor Andrew Hosmer said there are numerous exciting opportunities presented by the potential purchase of the building.

“I started thinking about this a few years ago,” he said. “I was anxious to see some more development on Main Street.”

He noted a lack of space on Canal Street, which is tightly-packed and runs next to the Colonial Theatre, contributes to traffic congestion when large tour buses and equipment trucks roll into town, causing problems for businesses there.

The purchase of the building and expansion of the theater would allow production equipment and personnel to be offloaded on neighboring Hanover Street, which runs parallel to Canal Street and is much larger, which would alleviate congestion downtown.

“That’s what I envisioned some years ago,” Hosmer said, noting that after several years the city has found who he believes to be the right partner in the development, “enhancing the investment the city made in the theater a few years ago.”

Ideally the city would not subdivide the portion of the building it would purchase, Hosmer said. If things worked out perfectly, all of the space would go to the theater, which would be able to host and produce larger events.

There is no detailed timeline for the development, but Hosmer hopes to initiate the process soon. After agreeing to a deal between all parties, the city and St. Clair would have to agree to a memorandum of understanding and St. Clair would require time to move out of the building.

“The city is ready to move forward,” Hosmer said. “We’re ready to move as fast as we can, keeping in mind that we must be sensitive to public comment.”

Potential buyers of the property have approached St. Clair over the last four years, with one deal nearly coming to fruition before the COVID pandemic put the brakes on the transaction, he said Friday.

The antique store, which hosts 80 to 85 vendors, was built in 1949 and 1950, and St. Clair has operated his business out of it for 14 years.

The building isn’t listed but he is looking to sell it for $1.2 million, he said. No official business had been done between the parties as of Friday afternoon.

“That’s what it’s always been,” St. Clair said. “It’s a great building.”

The property value, according to the city’s tax map database, is assessed at $487,600, and the most recent sale of the property went through at $315,000 in May 2015.

The idea that the building would be purchased by the city and a restaurateur in order to help support the Colonial Theatre appears to be a good idea, St. Clair added.

“It seems like a good mix,” he said. “That theater has been an incredible addition to the city.”

The theater has also been good for his business. He’s able to recount numerous occasions when shoppers in his store mentioned having seen it from outside before or after attending a show at the Colonial Theater.

“When I say the city, that’s what I’m talking about,” he said. “I’m talking about the citizens.”

Bryan Halperin, producer of the Powerhouse Theater Collaborative, said the opportunity is a phenomenal one for the theater and he is hopeful the deal goes through.

“There are some things lacking backstage,” he said, noting the complete lack of a dressing rooms among the core issues with the current space. As it stands, there is only what he deemed a “quick-change room” available to production participants, so when large shows come to town the cast must find any available corner of the building to switch in and out of their costumes.

He noted the stress traffic congestion puts on both the theater and area businesses and said the expansion to include Hanover Street would alleviate several problems. Trucks and buses would be able to park there, no longer forced to back down Canal Street from Beacon Street, and the fire exit could be moved into the old antique store to allow for storage at stage left.

“We gave the city the thumbs up,” he said. “We think that it’d be great for the city to do this.”

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