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Campbell officials await word on new dental clinic
By jeanne starmack
campbell
Campbell’s mayor and administrator are waiting to hear when or even if the ground will break for a dental clinic on U.S. Route 422.
The 4,000-square-foot clinic, which would be built on 3.6 acres of land the city turned over to developer United Dental Group LLC, would bring 35 jobs to the city, administrator Jack Dill said Monday.
The property was in the city’s land bank. Property in the land bank is used to help attract development, Dill said.
An abandoned nightclub, which eventually caught fire, stood on the site for many years but was torn down in April 2010.
The city turned the property over to the developer in January under a one-year agreement that if a development did not begin to materialize within that time, the city would take back the site.
Mayor Bill VanSuch said Monday he’d asked Dill to send a letter to the developer asking for a “commitment and a target date — when do they feel they’re going to start breaking ground.”
Dill said he sent the letter Thursday and followed up Monday with a phone call.
He said that when he talked to a representative of United Dental, he was told plans were still moving forward.
Dill said that in three to four weeks, he should have an answer for sure.
“[The developer] said in previous conversations that if it wasn’t going to move forward, he would immediately turn the property over to the city,” Dill said.
“We’re still very much interested in the dental clinic, but if they don’t move forward, we’re interested in other opportunities,” Dill continued. He said there is another party interested in the property, but he said he could not say who it is.