Mayor Carolyn Kirk said this morning that she's endorsing the proposed rezoning of the Commercial Street properties that contain the Birdseye and Chamber of Commerce buildings, and the "intention" of developing a hotel on the site.
Beauport Gloucester LLC, a limited liability corporation headed by New Balance Founder Jim Davis, has proposed placing a hotel overlay zoning district covering from 33 to 61 Commercial St. in advance of a planned development of a hotel and amenities on the site.
His company purchased the building from local developer Mac Bell last July in July for $6.5 million.
Kirk said she stands behind the rezoning because development at Birdseye, and development in general, will take the tax burden off of property owners.
"It simply comes down to the expansion of the tax base to make the community affordable for everybody," said Kirk, who outlines her full stand in the Mayor's Desk column that will appear in tomorrow's Times.
Development, or redevelopment, she said, is the only way the city can do that. Right now, she added, commercial property carries 10 percent of Gloucester's tax base.
For much more on this story, look to tomorrow's print and online editions of the Gloucester Daily Times and gloucestertimes.com. To have text updates regarding this story and other local Breaking News coverage, just sign up for the Times' free text alert service on the gloucestertimes.com homepage.
Steven Fletcher may be contacted at 1-978-283-7000 x3455, or sfletcher@gloucestertimes.com. Follow him on Twitter at @stevengdt.
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