City of New Haven DLDA Rendering
APT's proposed new Long Wharf HQ, methadone clinic.
The Elicker administration has reached a tentative agreement with the APT Foundation that, if approved by the Board of Alders, would see the city sell a 1.5‑acre plot on Long Wharf to allow for the development of a new 36,000 square-foot medical office building, outpatient treatment facility, and pharmacy.
As part of this deal, the APT Foundation would close its existing methadone clinic on Congress Avenue in the Hill and relocate those operations to its to-be-built new headquarters on Sargent Drive.
Those details and many more are laid out in a new Development and Land Disposition Agreement (DLDA) included in the Board of Alders agenda package for the board’s next meeting, which is scheduled for Wednesday.
Click here to read the proposal in full.
The proposal concerns a 1.5‑acre portion of the former Gateway Community College site at 60 Sargent Dr. (The parcel’s official address is 0 Sargent Dr.)
If the city succeeds in purchasing this property from the state and if the alders approve selling this part of the property to the APT Foundation, then the local healthcare nonprofit — which specializes in treating patients with substance use and mental health disorders — would construct a new building to replace and expand upon its existing Congress Avenue and Long Wharf Drive sites.
The new building would be located atop an existing parking lot on a part of the Sargent Avenue property behind the existing former Gateway building.
There is no specific sale price included in the DLDA. Instead, APT would be required to pay the city the exact same amount that the city winds up paying the state to acquire the land. Those negotiations between the city and state are still ongoing; according to the DLDA submission, the city seeks to purchase this land from the state by no later than June 28.
If approved by alders, the deal would also require the APT Foundation to close its existing methadone clinic at 495 – 517 Congress Ave. within 30 days of receiving a certificate of occupancy for the new Long Wharf facility.
APT has committed to consolidating all of its methadone treatment services within New Haven at the new Sargent Drive site. Per the DLDA, those methadone treatment services “shall not exceed the New Haven methadone program census of 1,350 from April 2023.” The proposed DLDA also allows APT to operate a “Mobile Opioid Treatment Program (MOTP)” which shall not be subject to that April 2023 methadone program census cap.
The proposed DLDA builds off of a one-year memorandum of understanding (MOU) that the Elicker administration and the APT Foundation signed in July 2023. “Although the DLDA has taken additional time to finalize,” reads a DLDA summary submitted to the alders, “the MOU set forth the basic contours of this DLDA.”
The proposed DLDA is listed as a “communication” on the alders’ Wednesday agenda, meaning that it now needs to be sent to an aldermanic committee for a public hearing and review before returning to the full Board of Alders for a potential final vote.
The DLDA also indicates that the APT Foundation has already submitted site plan documents for this new-construction project to the City Plan Department, which is reviewing the proposal to ensure it complies with the city’s Mixed-Use Long Wharf Zone. The City Plan Commission must sign off on this planned development before it can be built.
The DLDA marks the latest step forward for a years-in-the-making plan by City Hall to relocate APT’s methadone clinic from the Hill to a new building on Long Wharf. Hill neighbors have long criticized the Congress Avenue clinic – which is located right across the street from a public elementary and middle school — for pervasive substance use, drug dealing, and occasional violence outside APT’s doors.
A plan by the APT Foundation to relocate to a former school building in Newhallville, meanwhile, was scrapped following widespread community pushback at the prospect of a methadone clinic opening up in that location.
And so, in February 2023, Mayor Justin Elicker and APT CEO Lynn Madden announced at a public meeting in the Hill that the methadone clinic, with the city’s help, would try to relocate to a new-construction headquarters on Long Wharf. (In addition to its Congress Avenue clinic site, APT also presently operates a smaller office and outpatient treatment facility out of the medical office building at 1 Long Wharf Dr. It will close this location as well if and when it opens its new Sargent Drive building.)
“APT operates at 1 Long Wharf Drive and at 495 & 517 Congress Avenue (the “Congress Avenue Property”) along with other locations across the region and specializes in helping people with substance use and mental health disorders,” reads an overview of the DLDA that was included in the aldermanic submission. “As demand for its services grows, APT needs a larger space that is more aligned to APT’s specific requirements.”
That summary continues: “This proposed DLDA is a major step in both revitalizing the Long Wharf area and helping APT grow its services to meet community needs. It outlines a detailed, multi-step process that ensures the land transfer and future development align with public goals.”
The DLDA gives APT two years from the approval of this agreement — with the possibility for a six-month extension — to build its new Sargent Drive headquarters and relocate its Congress Avenue medical services.
APT is responsible for covering the costs of all of the design and development work associated with this project, except for the relocation of a utility pole and a related utility easement, which will be reimbursed by the city.
In addition to requiring APT to relocate its methadone clinic from Congress Avenue to Long Wharf, the deal also states that APT shall provide the City of New Haven with a “Right of First Refusal” in regards to the sale by APT of 495 – 517 Congress.
Laura Glesby file photo
Mayor Elicker, at the Feb. 2023 Hill meeting where he and Lynne Madden announced APT's Long Wharf plans.
Mayor Justin Elicker told the Independent on Monday that this does not mean that APT is required to sell its current Congress Avenue building. APT may choose to hold on to the property and use it for office space instead. But, if the healthcare nonprofit does decide to sell, then the City of New Haven will get first dibs on trying to buy it.
Elicker framed this proposed DLDA as “fully consistent with all of the work we’ve been sharing with the community” over the past few years. “It will be a significant improvement for all of New Haven because it will facilitate APT being able to provide appropriate treatment for residents without the impact to surrounding neighborhoods that we’ve seen at the Congress Avenue site.”
He said that the building’s new design “will minimize the ability of negative activities to occur” on site — thanks to a large indoor waiting area, like the one currently available at 1 Long Wharf. This new building will also not be right on the street, but instead will be located towards the back of the Sargent Drive lot, behind the former Gateway college building.