Cumberland — CUMBERLAND — The former site of Memorial Hospital, which was vacated when the hospital was consolidated into the Western Maryland Regional Medical Center in November, now has seven tenants who are reimbursing the city $16,000 a month.
“Without going into too many specifics, we have seven tenants,” said John Laughlin, president of Ridgecrest Investments Inc. of Frederick, who added that the tenants are using 31,000 square feet of space between them. “We have a variety of medical tenants and nonprofits and we’re proceeding along the path of having a bunch of different uses up there.”
Six of the tenants have already moved into the complex. One company is still waiting for construction on its facilities to be completed before moving in.
“We’re already giving them $16,000 a month and I think we’ll be doing much better in the future,” said Laughlin.
One of the tenants, J. Green Natural Foods, has announced plans to renovate the hospital kitchen into an assembly and manufacturing facility for the production of plant protein products such as vegetarian meat substitutes. It will initially be used largely as a commercial kitchen, but over time J. Green plans to consolidate more of its supply chain into one location, eventually using it for manufacturing as well.
“I have a long history of coming up here,” said J. Green CEO Ethan Brown of Washington. “We have a family farm up in Garrett County, and we’ve passed through the area for years. There’s a lot of natural beauty in the area and a good labor force. It’s a good area and I thought it’d be a good place to locate the company.
“We can’t give a firm number of jobs it’ll bring to the area right now,” said Brown. “But it’s a large market and we think we’ve got a good position.”
Brown said he isn’t sure if the facility would eventually provide retail services. “It’s still to be determined if people will be able to purchase products from this facility, but it’s not the main focus, which is the production of products and their delivery to hospitals and other locations,” said Brown.
J. Green has entered into a three-year lease with an option to renew for another three years. Brown said he sees no reason why the company wouldn’t keep the lease for the full six years.
“We’re a small early-stage business and have had first-rate support from the local business community, including the (Cumberland) Office of Economic Development, during our transition,” said Brown in a press release. “We are going to do our best to grow the company and hope we can make a positive contribution to the city of Cumberland.”
Ridgecrest’s agreement with the city involves a 10-year lease where Ridgecrest leases 10 percent of the property at a time. Ridgecrest is able to purchase the property at any time for $7 million, and the lease will automatically renew for another 10 years at the end of this period unless Ridgecrest gives the city written notice at least 90 days prior to the end of the agreement that it doesn’t want to continue the lease.
The agreement requires that Ridgecrest make progress in developing the property, and if at any point Ridgecrest is unable to continue leasing it, the city will be able to take the property back and find a new lessor or buyer if the property hasn’t already been purchased.
Cory Galliher can be reached at cgalliher@times-news.com.
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