The Middletown City Council on Dec. 3 approved the sale of a long-vacated building on King Street in the heart of downtown for $500,000.

The purchasers—Denali Realty Ventures, LLC, and O’Connell Family Contracting, LLC—plan to turn the four-story property into a mixed-use building with commercial spaces on the ground floor and 15 or so apartments on the upper levels.

“It is a key building in the central part of the downtown, next to the James Street parking lot, and we want to see it restored and utilized,” Middletown Mayor Joseph DeStefano told The Epoch Times.

“The proposal fits into our plan for getting more people to live and work downtown.”

DeStefano said the sale is expected to close by the end of the year, and the contract incentivizes developers to convert the building into productive use within three years.

“It is a dilapidated building that requires a lot of work,” he said.

The building at 11–15 King Street has been vacant for more than a decade. Years ago, the city took possession of it from a developer, hoping to facilitate its redevelopment.

Earlier this year, the city announced that it was seeking concepts of redevelopment for the building, and three proposals were submitted by mid-June. According to DeStefano, the two pending purchasers were the top bidders, outbidding the runner-up by $150,000.

In July, a review committee made up of DeStefano; Maria Bruni, the city’s economic development director; Jacob Tawil, public works commissioner; city attorney Alex Smith, and Common Council President Miguel Rodrigues picked the winners.

The city saw the redevelopment of the property as a key part of the downtown revival and its long-term plan to develop the central business district into a regional destination for cultural activities and entertainment, shopping, and dining, according to the public document “Request for Concepts/Qualifications.”

Private investments, coupled with public money such as the $10 million downtown revitalization state grants, have been the drivers of the continued urban renewal in the former railroad city, according to previous interviews with DeStefano.

In the past years, private investments flowing into Middletown have turned a vacated meatpacking facility into a brewery, a former sawmill into a mixed-used building with a restaurant and apartments, an abandoned hospital site into a medical college, and the old state psychiatric campus into a budding educational hub.

“It’s the government’s job to give direction, also to provide safety, security, cleanliness—all the basic services that government should provide, and then assist that private money coming into your community and making it work,” DeStefano previously said.

“That’s what’s happening. They call it making the sausage.”