HARWICH – With last month’s purchase of the Stonehorse Motel along Route 28 in Harwich, town officials will hear a redevelopment proposal for the site this month.
The motel was bought for $750,000 by Main Street Stone Horse, LLC from Outer Cape Health Services back in March. Ronald Rudnick has been identified as the owner of the property by The Secretary of State’s Corporation of Division.
Main Street Stone Horse is seeking permission from the town to construct two new dormitory buildings to house seasonal workers. In addition, plans call for the office area and gazebo to be rehabilitated an accessory shed, and an extensive landscape.
“There are existing motel buildings on the property and addition to that there’s a building we call an office building, where people checked in and out. All the motel buildings are going to be removed and the office building will remain,” said William Riley, the attorney representing Main Street Stone Horse.
“In place of the existing motel buildings, my client wants to construct two buildings that will have a total of either 88 or 89 rooms between the two buildings. The idea is that these would be designed for workforce housing. Primarily, for the non-citizens who arrive with visas to work for a season, my client has considerable experience in providing living accommodations for those kind of workers. He has established relationships with the kind of companies who utilize that help.”
The company is planning for seasonal occupation of the facilities in the spring, summer and fall months. The company, and supporters of the project, expect improvements in traffic safety in the area as seasonal workers typically don’t have automobiles.
Riley says the housing would not be designed or ideal for year-round use.
“They’re essentially setup as dormitories. There’s a long central corridor with bedroom doors on each side. Each room would consist of two beds with a shared bathroom with the next room, so one bathroom per two rooms,” Riley explained.
“There will be a central kitchen area and central sort of lounge, so if they do want to cook in the building there will be a place they can cook, kind of like a communing kitchen and common eating area.”
The 2.6-acre property has been left unused for the better part of a decade. OCHS purchased the property in 2014 after four years of not being used, planning to build a new medical center.
Plans to convert the former Thompson’s Farm Market building onto a medical center never panned out and the property was then purchased by Tom and Trish Kennedy, owners of Zudy, a local software company.
The Harwich Planning Board will review the proposal in a hearing scheduled for April 23 at Harwich Town Hall.
By TIM DUNN, CapeCod.com News Center
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