Date Set For Purecoat Decision to Board

Despite vacation plans and a need to hurry along the process, the committee of the Belmont Municipal Light Department created to find a site for a new electrical substation will meet the last week in July with the Belmont Board of Selectmen in their role as the Municipal Light Board to discuss the committee's selection of the three-acre Purecoat North plant on Hittinger Street to build the nearly $40 million facility.

The meeting will take place Monday, July 26 at 7 p.m. in the Selectmen's Board Room in Town Hall.

The board will hear a formal recommendation from the 115 kV substation site selection committee as well as a discussion of the site before excluding the public by entering into executive session to get down to the nitty-gritty of acquiring the land and how negotiations are currently going.

According to Committee Chairman Robert McLaughlin, in an Email to fellow members of the site selection committee, after the Board gives its final approval of the plan, "we need to finalize a (purchase & sale) agreement and proceed to call a special Town Meeting for September."

McLaughlin also said he hoped the meeting with the Selectmen/Light Board "is going to be pro forma."

"Our recommendation is solid," said McLaughlin.

While a few people were seeking a delay until August so they could attend the meeting, McLaughlin veto those plans because "we can't hold off Tosi any longer."

Tosi refers to the third generation of the Tosi family that owns Purecoat North LLC and the Belmont location.

Since opening its 40,000 square foot facility nearly 40 years ago, the one-time Cambridge Plating has been the target of residents who claimed the industrial electroplating, polishing and coloring operation was not the right mix for a heavily residential area.

While McLaughlin has been limited in what he's willing to divulge on the site selection committees decision to take the Purecoat North location over that of the High School, the BMLD has released a cost comparison of each site.

The BMLD estimates that it will pay $6.3 million to purchase the Purecoat site. It also believes that the surplus land, approximately two-thirds of the site, will attract $3,340,000 when it is sold five to six years down the road.

The numbers have for onsite construction costs at the Purecoat North site (in $ millions)

Substation equipment                7.713

Building                                            0.703

Site prep and foundation          1.412

HPOF cable                                     9.145

Control conduit wire and cable 0.833

Steel structures                             0.079

Engineering                                    2.267

Contingency                                   3.962

Subtotal                                26.114

Site purchase                                    6.300

Façade                                                  0.250

Traffic control                                  0.235

Road construction                           6.894                          

Site prep                                               0.422

Ext payments/lease income         0.300

Market value of land                   

held for future use                          (3.340)              

Environmental remediation         0.359

Subtotal                                11.420

Distribution upgrades                     3.000

Operation and maintenance          0.879

Subtotal                                3.879

Total cost                              39.798