51 Elm gets closer to opening this spring

LACONIA — As the spring completion of Lakeport's 51 Elm project approaches, its final pieces are falling into place.

The City of Laconia is considering different parking options facing the future commercial storefronts — a public hearing on which will be held at the city council's Jan. 9 meeting — and the Planning Board approved a request earlier this month to change the ownership structure of 51 Elm's residences from apartments to condominiums.

The housing category change taps into complicated themes about what revitalization developments promise and how they are perceived. 

Developer Scott Everett’s projects have been credited with breathing new life into the neighborhood, but the progress comes at a cost to some people who had called that area home. 

Construction on the project began in 2021 after Everett purchased an apartment building at 79 Elm St. and demolished it.

Initial plans included 20 apartments above a retail space with seven slots for businesses. Now the developer has the option to sell those units as condominiums.

The request was presented to the planning board by Attorney Sarah N. Rubury, of Westcott Law. Westcott represents Paugus Fore I LLC, owned by Everett.

The request was quickly approved by the board with minor verbal dissent.

“This is not the first time I've seen someone make an application for apartments and come back and say we're going to change it to condominiums,” said Planning Board Member Charlie St. Clair. “I'm not disapproving of this, but I do want to say for the public record it would have been great for the city if those were apartments. If I was moving into town to look for a place to live, it would certainly be a lot easier for me financially to get an apartment, even though those are kind of pricey too, but condominiums are tough.”

Prices for the Elm Street condos are still being determined. Units at a nearby lakefront condo development on Union Avenue are topping $1 million.

Planning Board Member Mike DellaVecchia also expressed some discomfort with the request, but also did not vote against it.

“I just have to voice my disappointment,” DellaVecchia said. “Scott said he was building this building and we were all happy saying, 'Oh we're going to have 20 new rentals in Lakeport!' and it would have been nice to have rentals there. It doesn't help our housing situation.”

“Well, it certainly won't probably be potentially mid-income housing,” St. Clair added.

The commercial space that comprises the first floor was also approved to change to a condominium ownership as one large unit with seven sub-units for leasing purposes.

“They will be a single unit with a single owner. It's also provided in the condominium documents that there might be an option to later turn that into sub-condos and sell those units, but that would require a new approval process here,” Rubury stated.

Laconia Planning Department Director Dean Trefethen called the change in ownership “fairly routine.”

Tim-James Everett, senior adviser for Paugus-Elm Development and Scott Everett's brother, cited financial pressures from the pandemic as instrumental in the decision to switch from apartments to condos.

“COVID changed the entire landscape over the past two years, prices for construction went up dramatically, and condominium prices went up, so we re-applied for the condominium designation, so we’d have more flexibility based on the dramatic changes in the market conditions,” Tim-James Everett said. “Now that we’ve been approved to sell the units as condominiums, it gives us the flexibility to sell or rent them as apartments and that flexibility helps us keep the project solvent.”

“I see both sides, but it's a shame because we definitely need apartments,” said Tony Felch, councilor of Ward 6, which includes the 51 Elm development.

In a column published in The Sun, Scott Everett wrote that his projects downtown were not about maximizing financial gain.

“I am not investing in these projects because they are the best way to put capital to work,” Everett wrote. “It is because, like you, I care immensely about this community and I want to see it flourish.”

St. Clair said that future purchasers will have the right to lease the condos out as apartments and cited precedent in other developments around the city.

“We've seen that happen on Water Street, at the old Alan Rogers building,” St. Clair noted, also citing recent rentals of the new units above the Colonial Theatre. “Those are all condos but many of them are rented out by the owners. It's kind of the same end result.”

“There's also a 30-day minimum to lease it out, so that eliminates the option of having it as an Airbnb," added Planning Board Member Stacy Soucy.

The redevelopment of Lakeport is just one piece of addressing the city’s housing vacuum.

“Since Everett himself has torn down quite a few of the apartments,” Felch said, "That was brought up at one of the meetings myself, that we're losing apartments instead of gaining apartments by the project he's doing and now apparently it's even more.”

In 2021, over a dozen tenants were displaced when the building was sold from the Community Action Program to Paugus Fore I LLC.

“That building was always a rough spot,” said Laconia Police Chief Matt Canfield. “We went a number of times for various types of calls. Numerous domestics, there were drug issues before.”

“I've been here so long, it's gone through waves depending on who owned it,” said neighbor and Planning Board Member Peter Brunette. “There were a fair number of transient people that were not tenants of record or couch surfing-types staying with tenants on and off. Crime was a problem.”

Lakeport's redevelopment is seen as improving a downtrodden area and making the neighborhood friendlier for commerce. 

“It's an improvement to the area,” Canfield said. “Definitely will bring it up, as hard as those short-term growing pains are for some.”

Catherine McLaughlin contributed to this story.