Officials behind the 130-store outlet mall, which is planned off Industrial Drive near Exit 10 of the F.E. Everett Turnpike, have strayed from the water sampling conditions agreed upon in the project’s development agreement, town officials and water consultants have acknowledged.
But the deviations, which broke the timing, frequency and other sampling conditions, have no bearing on the outcome of the water tests and will not cause any delay in the construction work, officials said.
Project planners, at work for several months preparing the site, plan to hold a formal groundbreaking ceremony Wednesday morning.
“While there were some deviations to the required protocols, they were not deemed to have any material impact on the (water testing) results,” Town Manager Keith Hickey said earlier this month. “(Premium Outlets) and consultants have been advised to adhere to protocols in the future.”
Project opponents George Mitsch and Mike Mills, who live within a mile of the construction site, raised questions about the water testing earlier this summer before the Town Council, among other boards. Mitsch and Mills claimed that the project developer, Premium Outlets, failed to adhere to the schedule, the limits or the terms of water sampling defined in their 2008 agreement with the Merrimack Planning Board.
The tests are intended to provide a baseline to measure against the impacts of the project, and the breaches could leave the town without legal recourse should the project impact the water supply, said Mills and Mitsch, both members of the Concerned Citizens of Merrimack Alliance. The group was formed in opposition to the project after it was introduced in 2004.
“My belief is they should not start until there’s a real record of those water levels,” Mitsch said last week. “But I don’t know if the town has (courage) enough to stand up to these folks.”
Development group officials defended their efforts this week, saying they have been working closely with the necessary agencies to meet the testing obligations and schedules. And their efforts have shown “No significant water-quality issues of concern have been identified during the background sampling,” James McSweeney, superintendent of the Merrimack Village District, the town’s water supplier, wrote in response to the inquiries.
Emery and Garrett Groundwater Inc., the town’s water consultant, acknowledged that the developer did not conduct the sampling on the schedule defined by the agreement. Premium Outlets did not complete a round of testing in November, and the developer failed to conduct any sampling this spring, among other deviations, company President James Emery and project geologist Jeff Marts wrote in response to the inquiry.
But with baseline water results already in place, the deviations are more the result of unrealistic scheduling demands than lapses in the testing, Emery and Marts wrote. “It is (our) professional opinion that the timing of the proposed sampling events ... is not a reasonable expectation and furthermore is not critical to further understanding the groundwater quality underlying this site,” they wrote.
With the testing questions answered, developers intend to move forward with the $100 million project, in the works since 2004. Work crews started preparing the land in July, and Wednesday’s groundbreaking will mark the start of phase I, to include the construction of the first 100 stores spread over 392,000 square feet, according to Michele Rothstein, senior vice president of marketing for Premium Outlets, a division of the Simon Property Group.
Company officials will consider the next phase after the first stores open, likely in 2012, Rothstein said.
In total, the project will create about 500 construction jobs and 1,000 full or part-time service jobs, she said.
“We are very excited to be moving forward,” Rothstein wrote earlier this summer in an e-mail to The Telegraph. “The start of construction will not only mean that we are closer to bringing great outlet shopping to the area, but it will immediately represent construction jobs and good retail jobs when we open.”
SOURCE: Nashua Telegraph By JAKE BERRY
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