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Silver & Gold
Fueled by new energy and newfound cooperation, Meriden starts to attain economic-development traction
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Business New Haven
3/5/2001
By: Mimi Houston
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Meriden's tomorrow, according to city economic-development officials, looks as bright as your grandmother's polished sterling. But don't let Stephen Zerio, city councilor and member of the economic development, housing and zoning committee hear you say that. He's got an image of another color for Meriden's future that he wants to promote.
“We've shaken off the Silver City of the past and we're looking to the Golden City of the future,” he crows.
“We're very optimistic about Meriden's future,” adds Randall Kamerbeek, director of economic development and chair of, the Meriden Economic Development Corp. (MEDCO).
“We're very well situated geographically in the Northeast [Meriden is at the center of three major highways: I-91, I-691 and the Merritt Parkway] and we've got one of the best IT infrastructures in the state,” Kamerbeek adds. “Our fiber optics and data network are fully in place. We're able to serve all IT needs.”
In the words of advertising executives everywhere, Kamerbeek has described Meriden's most marketable strength: location, location, location.
David Ball is principal architect for the B.L. Companies, an architectural/engineering firm of about 100 employees. Like numerous other businesses, theirs recently decided to move to Meriden from Hamden. Why? You guessed it - location.
“There is a lot of good, new development going on,” says Ball. “This is a vital area: I-91 combined with the Merritt Parkway and being right in the center of New Haven and Hartford makes it very helpful to businesses.”
“There are a whole bunch of different things going on at the same time,” echoes Sean Moore, Meriden chamber of commerce president. “That's the exciting part. From the east side to the west side. We're growing in the tourism and hospitality field, in research and IT communications as well as lots of retail activity going on outside the Westfield [Meriden Square] Mall. Without a doubt, it's definitely a good time to do business in Meriden.”
“Meriden has a substantial retail base,” adds Kamerbeek. “We've got auto sales, healthy manufacturing - from machine tools to high technology to electrical equipment. We've got a government base, including federal and state agencies moving in. We're much less dependent on one industry than we were in the past.
“We were a one-industry, two-industry town, and we went through the pain of what happens when that industry is weakened,” he says. “We're working very hard to correct that, and I think we've succeeded.”
City officials today are working from a comprehensive economic-development strategy funded by a federal grant from the U.S. Economic Development Agency designed to improve Meriden by offering a number of different initiatives, many of which are well underway.
These include, to the relief of downtown business owners, a $6.1 million plan to control area flooding - a persistent and costly problem for a city built on swampland.
“We've had a problem with flooding for about 200 years,” says Mayor Joseph Marinan, “and we're just getting around to dealing with it now.”
While officials agree there is still much work to be done, there is visible evidence of the city's new and glowing hue already.
“Our public spaces downtown are brand-new,” explains Kamerbeek. “Including everything underground such as water mains and all utilities.” He likes to tell a story of some former residents who came back to town after a long absence and exclaimed, “This is Meriden?”
“There is a joint study going on funded in part by the city and in part by the YMCA,” Kamerbeek says, “to look for resources for arts and entertainment. The report is due out next month.”
Tourism and arts and entertainment are niches that Meriden has big plans to develop in the future. Meriden now has its own symphony, its own theater company (the Castle Craig Players), and is looking to devote an area downtown to theater space, dance studios and artists lofts.
Each April the city celebrates its daffodil festival with fireworks, a parade, food booths, a crafts fair and, of course, plenty of daffodils. The festival pulls in from 70,000 to 100,000 people a year. More events that make Meriden a destination place are in the future.
If those responsible for Meriden's current growth have it their way, many more of us will be saying that sooner or later. For a growing number of companies, it's sooner.
Meriden can boast a list of recent additions to its economic base that other cities in Connecticut would be delighted to own. Cox Communications, one of the state's largest cable providers calls Meriden home, as do Radio Frequency Systems [RFS] Cablewire and ADC Broadband, IT communications equipment manufacturing companies.
Three major bioscience research companies - Protein Sciences, Bristol-Meyers Squibb and Packard Bioscience Co. - the first brand-new hospital built in the state in 20 years, and the Village at Kensington Place, a retirement/assisted living community specializing in Alzheimer care, all have recently acquired Silver City addresses.
Candlewood Suites Hotel has recently put out its welcome mat, and two other major national-chain hotels were just approved for a nearby site: another extended stay facility and one with a conference center. Sheraton and Hilton Hotels have shown interest in the joint site, but final agreements are still being negotiated. These hotels reflect the growth of major corporate headquarters moving into the area and assigning out-of-town executives to long-term stays during settling-in periods.
“We've built a brand new magnet school,” says Zerio, “and a merchant power plant looking at Meriden as it's new location.”
Do you like to shop at Target? Now you don't have to travel to West Hartford. Come October, the store's graphic red-and-white bull's-eye logo will brighten Meriden's West Side.
“We're making sure that when people come into Meriden,” states Zerio, “there's something we can offer them.”
“We're working on bringing more business to this community,” says Marinan, who has been mayor since 1993.
“We've had some healthy grand list growth, but there was a price to pay.” He cites those who lost their homes in the name of Meriden's growth.
“We have to do something that's been impossible to do since the beginning of time,” he continues, “create land.” Homes in Meriden have been bought by the city to increase their commercial zoning space.
“We're a very old community,” adds Moore. “And we're dealing with something called spot-zoning.” That is, an area may have a condition that teams commercial and residential zoning, resulting in what looks like an avenue of confusion. So, Aunt Ida's house has the hardware store, doughnut shop and town laundromat as next-door neighbors.
“The trick now is to have our city planner really sit down and...plan,” says Moore. “That is, choose the entire section to be zoned as commercial or residential.”
“We've had to change the look of neighborhoods,” adds Marinan. “People have seen houses being turned into industrial areas. Any greenlands we do have we're saving for high-profile corporate structures.
“It's very difficult to say to residents, 'We're going to change your zone from residential to commercial.' And in the future it won't get easier. These are people's homesteads.”
As some consolation, the mayor says the city pays top dollar for the homes it seizes by eminent domain, pays all moving fees and hires real-estate agents to help homeowners find new, similar properties. Any plans for former structures, he says, are responsibly enacted.
“When we demolish - and we've demolished over 205 buildings already” Marinan says, “we do not leave the sites vacant. We maintain them, sod and fence everything, even plant flowers.”
But Marinan admits this kind of land creation only goes so far.
“I've got four different requests right now for over 40,000 square feet of business space for each one, and I don't have it,” he laments. “We're probably going to lose three out of the four.”
Marinan says another big problem his city faces is loss of business to nearby towns such as Wallingford. Much of the problem is the aforementioned scenario: needing space that - right now - simply doesn't exist. Coupled with Wallingford's attractive package - lower tax rate, lots of underdeveloped or vacant space, and its own power plant, resulting in a full 20 percent reduction in utility bills - keeping businesses in the city can be tough.
Marinan says it is frustrating to watch Meriden lose potential businesses due to these problems, but acknowledges that there are no quick solutions.
Another very visible challenge is blighted housing. Meriden is not immune to this ubiquitous city problem, and Marinan says officials are working to address the issue, but admits some areas have deteriorated at a faster rate that they can keep up with.
“We've got a pre-war housing-stock issue to address,” he says. “Some of our older neighborhoods are disintegrating. It's a tremendous job, and it's getting ahead of us. We're starting to see some areas where we really have to address this.”
But Marinan is quick to point out programs the city is running to effect positive change. He says there are thousands of dollars available to residents in neighborhood loan programs, and an new home-ownership program offering first-time homebuyers lucrative purchasing rates designed to make Meriden an attractive place to live as well as to work in.
“We've got the right projects,” he asserts, “the right strategies in place. The difficult thing now is to get the word out. To make it known to people these programs are available to them.”
But despite the admittedly imposing difficulties Meriden faces, there is unarguable economic, manufacturing and industrial growth. Many officials thank the healthy, progressive relationships between and among key players.
This is in large part thanks to one Larry McGoldrich, a multi-generational Meriden resident and president of MEDCO.
“One of the things this town was missing was a hometown bank,” he explains. After spending a career working for other banks, McGoldrich decided to create Castle Bank, Meriden's only local bank.
“Our doors opened in April 1999,” McGoldrich recounts. “We're profitable and we're growing. We've got a second office on the east side of town, and I can see the bank growing into Wallingford in the future.”
McGoldrich created the bank for Meriden, but he also did something equally vital to the city. He helped stimulate communication among city officials.
“I think that's something that's lacking in trying to build towns - cooperation,” he notes. “We've worked very hard together to make sure we get together more often,” he says of himself and other leaders of Meriden's business community.”
It was McGoldrich's idea to invite them to come together for quarterly economic roundtable luncheons. Those typically attending include the mayor, Sean Moore, Steve Zerio, Randy Kamerbeek and other influential players.
“We always have a special guest,” explains McGoldrich. “and we always visit a different area restaurant. The one thing I do insist on is that the table really be round. We all face each other, and each person gets five minutes to say what they've been working on. We hear from our special guest - one time it was [U.S. Rep.] Jim Maloney [D-5] - and then we eat, talk and just get to know one another.
“As we started to learn more about what the others were doing,” McGoldrich says, “we found we could enhance their results by complementing each other. Before we had the luncheons, we didn't really know what the others were doing. There was no coordination to it all. By the act of something so simple as getting together around a table and talking, we've gotten so much more communicative. Now we all say, 'What's the best way we can work with each other to help the others in their goals/'”
It is this latter-day propensity among business leaders and city officials to work together that helps explain much of Meriden's positive momentum.
Growth. That's the key word that sums up Meriden's future. Marinan anticipates more incubator companies like those now housed on Research Parkway.
“One of our cable-related businesses had some tremendous growth and expanded from a smaller facility in North Haven to their own 600,000-square-foot facility - RFS Cablewire,” says Marinan. “You can see them now from I-91 as you drive by.”
And officials express excitement about growth in another facet of civic life.
“There is a joint study going on, funded in part by the city and in part by the YMCA, to look for resources for arts and entertainment,” Marinan says. The report is due out next month.
“I'd like to see Meriden become a destination,” adds Zerio. “To be more than the Meriden Square [Mall]. I'm looking toward destination restaurants, destination events like the symphony, art gallery, shows, opera, regional theater.
“Hartford and New Haven are like jewels set in Connecticut's crown. We want to be one of them,” says Zerio. “I believe that we are.”
And everyone knows that crowns are made of gold.
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