Barefield Development Corp. has reached the halfway point in its $3.5 million project to turn a former knitting mill in Pottsville into 11 apartments for the elderly, Barefield CEO Craig S.L. Shields said Monday.
"The workers are ahead of schedule. They have until September but the work might be done sometime in August," Shields said.
New stairwells and walls, windows and vinyl siding are among the improvements Grimm Construction, Waymart, Wayne County, the general contractor, made to the building at 317 1/2 N. Ninth St.
City Administrator Thomas A. Palamar toured the building Thursday.
"It's a great re-use of a building. You look at a neighborhood like that. It's a tight city neighborhood. There's not much space between homes and the homes near that building. And you wonder what the future of that neighborhood would have been like if that building had become ignored, or blighted. And this is a great example of how you can prevent blight from taking place," Palamar said.
Established in 2001, Barefield is a nonprofit development group that has acquired and restored more than 30 Pottsville properties. While it operates the Necho Allen building - an apartment complex for the elderly and disabled - tax free, its other properties pay taxes to the city, county and school board.
On April 15, 2011, Barefield bought the 32,000-square-foot building along with a 19-vehicle capacity parking lot for $1 from Alpha Mills Corp., according to Shields and the online Schuylkill Parcel Locator.
Jacob Boltz Knitting Mill owned the building since the early 1960s.
The property was known as the Boltz Knitting Mill, a division of Alpha Mills, according to a sign above the door.
In April 2012, Barefield received $3.2 million in a competitive tax-credit program through the Pennsylvania Housing Finance Agency, Harrisburg, to finance the project.
In late 2012, the project cost went up to $3.5 million. Barefield applied for another $300,000 worth of tax credits and received them in February, Shields said.
"The Tax Credit Program does not provide loans or grants but rather a tax incentive to owners of affordable rental housing. A developer markets or 'syndicates' the credits allocated to the development to investors whose contributions are used as equity in the development's financing plan," according to the website for the Pennsylvania Housing Finance Agency.
The funds are being distributed through Fulton Bank, Hamburg.
Barefield does not receive the funds in one lump sum.
"As the project goes on, I have to submit payment requests," Shields said.