Forest City Development Enterprises of Cleveland, Ohio (www.forestcity.net) is considering redeveloping several old factory buildings into new housing. These buildings include Hamel Leather factory on Essex Street and the building at 10 Duncan Street. Forest City is considering making a $50 million investment into downtown Haverhill.

Last month Secretary of State William Galvin awarded Historic District Tax Credits throughout the state. The largest grant in the State, $3 million, went to the proposed Forest City project in Haverhill. Another $1 million went to the Beacon project. These grants, combined with the $2 million in credits given to the Beacon project earlier, mean a total of $6 million in Historic Tax Credits to downtown redevelopment in the City of Haverhill.

Mayor James J. Fiorentini called the historic district credits “A major boost for economic revitalization in downtown”. “Our plan to revitalize Haverhill has always been to use Brownfield’s funding and other tools such as historic tax credits to put old shoe factories back onto the tax rolls. This $3 million in tax credits is a major step forward for this project. Although it is certainly not definite that the project will go forward, these historic credits are a major boost to the project.”

Fiorentini, who personally lobbied Secretary Galvin for the credits, called it “a team effort” “This was a united team effort by the city, our legislative delegation and Secretary Galvin to move this project forward. We thank the Secretary of State and we thank the legislators including Senator Baddour and Representative Dempsey who worked hard with us to obtain these funds. The work of our entire legislative delegation was critical to obtaining these funds.”

State historic tax credits are allocated by the Secretary of State based upon an evaluation of the project. “Obviously, the Secretary saw this project as being a worthwhile project, as do we.”