Moriarty, Rick. “There’s Gold in Those ‘Brownfields.’” Syracuse Herald American 5 Sept. 1999.
S&W Redevelopment plans to clean up abandoned industrial sites — and turn a profit.
The lot at 531 Liberty Street sat vacant for 26 years. Until now, no developer wanted it. Even though $162,000 in back taxes have piled up on it since 1973, the city of Syracuse hasn’t dared seize it. And there’s good reason.
The property once was the site of a gas station. Its underground gasoline tanks have leaked, contaminating the soil. No one has wanted the hassle and cost of cleaning it up.
“We’ll threaten (to take a property) but a lot of times, if there’s a significant environmental problem, we won’t go through with it,” said Steve Gross, deputy finance commissioner for the city. “We don’t want to get on the chain of title. The lawyers won’t let us.”
But an engineering firm has agreed to step in where no one else would. S&W Redevelopment, LLC of Cazenovia has reached an agreement with the city to acquire the property, clean it up and redevelop it. In exchange for that promise the city will seize the property from its owner, Mann Realty Inc., and sell it to S&W for $1,000. S&W isn’t doing it out of the goodness of its heart. They expect to make money off the deal. Robert Petrovich, vice president of the company, said the firm may build a small office building, a quick-service restaurant, or a convenience store on the property.
S&W sees the site at the corner of Liberty and Spencer Streets as an ideal location for commercial development because it is just a few blocks west of the Carousel Center shopping center, which The Pyramid Companies plan to significantly expand, possibly next year. Once that expansion happens, much of the traffic that now travels down West Hiawatha Boulevard will be rerouted past the Liberty Street property. The Liberty Street deal is the first of what Petrovich hopes will me many such “brownfield” redevelopments by S&W. Brownfield refers to former industrial sites that can be cleaned up and once more turned into productive properties.
A Niche in the Market
S&W was formed two years ago as an offshoot of Stearns & Wheler, LLC, an engineering firm that has specialized in environmental services since its founding in 1950 by the late Don Stearns, a former dean of engineering at Syracuse University. (Wastewater engineer, Gordon Wheler, joined the firm in 1955 and retired in 1989.)