Long-delayed Bayside project faces new legal threat
A new legal threat looms over The Federated Cos.’s long-delayed mixed-use Bayside project on Somerset Street in Portland.
The Forecaster reported that Portland lawyer Patrick Venne told the weekly newspaper that Federated Cos. is considering a lawsuit against the city alleging a breach of contract over agreements related to the Midtown project.
““We are pursuing the maximum amount of damages allowed by law,” Venne said.
The Forecaster reported that lawsuit threat came after the city denied a building permit for a parking garage and the March 24 expiration of city approvals for the project, which was approved by the Planning Board in 2015.
Portland City Manager Jon Jennings told The Forecaster that he questioned whether Federated Cos. has the financial capacity to carry out the estimated $85 million project.
“We are pursuing the maximum amount of damages allowed by law,” local attorney Patrick Venne told the paper about suing the city for breach of contract, after the city denied a building permit for a parking garage and city approvals for the project expired March 24.
The project — with garage, 440 housing units and about 90,000 square feet of retail space on former city-owned land extending from Somerset and Elm streets to Somerset and Pearl streets — was approved by the planning board in 2015.
And in 2016, the $2.3 million sale of the land by the city to Federated was expected to make the development a reality. The sale and development of the land were the culmination of a decade-long effort by city planners. Construction was expected to start that summer, pending removal of contaminated soil.
But since then, “not a single shovel of dirt has been moved,” Jennings told The Forecaster.
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