Norwich ― More than 50 city government and business leaders gathered on the City Hall plaza Friday to celebrate $6 million in federal pandemic recovery funds spent on local development projects.

For every dollar spent, Norwich Community Development Corp. President Kevin Brown said, another $6 in private funding was spent on the recipient projects.

Upon receipt in April 2021 of $28.8 million in American Rescue Plan Act grant money ― the highest total for any municipality in the Second Congressional District ― the Norwich City Council agreed to turn over $3.5 million to the Norwich Community Development Corp. for economic development.

Another $2.5 million would go to larger, more difficult development projects, including a plan to transform the former vacant, blighted YMCA building on Main Street into Mattern Construction Co.’s new headquarters.

On Friday, Brown stood at the podium and raised his arms as if to envelop the audience of business recipients attending Friday’s celebration. An oversized check for $6 million stood as one prop alongside a rendering of Mattern’s new Main Street headquarters.

“This audience crosses a very diverse array both in scale and in the cultural makeup of this city,” Brown said. “You see everybody represented.”

Brown touted projects from one end of Main Street to the other, extended to Norwich Harbor. The Marina at American Wharf is proposed to receive $250,000 in one of the final ARPA allocations to help renovate the marina restaurant. Brown used the new name, Crossings at 345, for Mattern’s project, “never to be spoken of as the YMCA building again.”

The projects include rental housing, a hotel, the marina, retail and restaurants, manufacturing and construction industries.

U.S. Rep. Joe Courtney, D-2nd District, admitted that he hears some grumbling that Norwich received more ARPA money than any other municipality in eastern Connecticut. Courtney described ARPA as an infusion of dollars to state and local governments for pandemic recovery.

Courtney credited Norwich City Manager John Salomone for his vision of how the money could be used, with projects ready to get off the ground immediately. Courtney credited NCDC for embracing housing as a critical need in the region. One recipient, Water Street Lofts, has 42 apartments a few doors from Courtney’s congressional district office on Main Street.

“I cannot say enough good things about the way people came together to really recognize that this was a really special opportunity,” Courtney said, “and that we really had to spend it smart, and wisely. And that’s exactly what’s on display here today.”

One grant recipient, J.D. Donner, owns a two-story commercial plaza at 190 W. Town St. that includes his own Antenna Salon on the second floor. The building did not have an elevator. During the pandemic, Donner said, a couple of businesses left, and others that expressed interest in locating there turned away because of the lack of an elevator.

An elevator proved cost prohibitive.

But Donner looked into the new NCDC grant program and his Donner Family LLC was among the first eight businesses to receive Norwich Revitalization Program grant awards in June 2022. Donner received $37,500 to install a vertical lift to allow customers, including those with wheelchairs, to reach the second floor.

Donner thanked NCDC for the agency’s patience as he struggled for years to order and receive the equipment. Donner hosted a ribbon-cutting for the new lift this past June.

“It did make quite a difference, and I told everybody about it,” Donner said.

Mayor Peter Nystrom called the Norwich Revitalization Program a godsend for the community, as it came on the heels of the city’s own taxpayer-approved downtown revitalization program that had just run out of funds as the ARPA money became available.

Nystrom said that model helped Norwich prove it could get government grant money into the streets.

“It’s so important that people understand that a city is here to work with them if they are running a business,” Nystrom said. “Because it’s tough today. It’s very difficult to run a business.”

c.bessette@theday.com