Hartford Business Journal

18 HARTFORDBUSINESS.COM | MARCH 4, 2024 Christopher Reilly is the president of Hartford-based real estate developer Lexington Partners, which is the managing partner of the Port Eastside project in East Hartford. HBJ PHOTO | MICHAEL PUFFER Practical Vision 'More modest,' but still ambitious redevelopment plan for East Hartford's Founders Plaza to move forward the ailing shopping center into 595 apartments and 100 townhomes, along with a new hotel, restaurants and entertainment space less than a half-mile from the shoreline. Lexington is currently acting as managing partner of the East Hart- ford Port Eastside project. It helped shape the plan into an achievable format under current conditions, Reilly said. Port Eastside will be built in phases, he said, adding apartment buildings with several hundred units each, one at a time. As one building fills, another will be developed; Reilly estimates the market can accommodate up to 1,000 units. If approved by the town, the first multifamily building could be deliv- ered in about three years, and the entire project built out in a decade, he said. "As things are absorbing, we can make the determination to go onto the next project," Reilly said. "We need to prove to the bank and inves- tors that it makes sense." The Port Eastside redevelopment is getting state support. State policymakers set aside $6.5 million in bond funding to cover the development team's plan to demolish portions of the 50-year-old Founders Plaza office park along the Connecticut River. Meanwhile, town leaders are working on a project agreement with the development partners, spelling out their deliverables in exchange for the state funding. Reilly said the development group expects to tap a portion of those funds in the second quarter of this year to begin demolition of a By Michael Puffer mpuffer@hartfordbusiness.com L ast summer, a group of prominent local businessmen announced an $841 million plan to transform the aging Founders Plaza office complex in East Hartford into 1,000 apartments, 300,000 square feet of commercial space, new transport links and greatly expanded park and passive recreational amenities. After crunching the numbers, the partners in the "Port Eastside" project are now pursuing a scaled- back version of the project. The current concept is more tightly focused on multifamily residential near the east bank of the Connecticut River, said Chris- topher Reilly, president of Hart- ford-based real estate developer and investor Lexington Partners. The developers have, for now, dropped their involvement in a planned transportation hub and pedestrian bridge over the Connecticut River, and reduced their expectation for new commercial space to about 70,000 square feet. The developers will also be less directly involved in pushing for expanded park-like green space around their project. "It is still ambitious, but it is a lot more modest," Reilly said. "We are honoring as much of that vision as we can while being practical about it." Reilly said the original grander vision can't be accomplished given the higher interest-rate environment and tougher lending market. In addition to Lexington Partners, the development group behind Port Eastside includes Hoffman friends and business partners — were recruited into the Port Eastside partnership last year. Kenny subse- quently died of a sudden heart attack in September, but his firm remains committed to the project, Reilly said. Leading the charge Lexington has been the driving force behind a string of high-profile developments around Connecticut "I think every great and transformative project like this starts with a vision, but at the end of the day has to be manageable and reasonable." — East Hartford Mayor Connor Martin Auto Group Co-Chairman Jeffrey S. Hoffman; Manafort Brothers Inc. President Jim Manafort; Peter S. Roisman, head of Houston-based multifamily investor REV; and Figure 8 Properties principals Harris and Bruce Simons. Lexington Partners founder Martin Kenny and prolific Hartford busi- nessman Alan Lazowski — longtime in recent years. The largest — a $90 million conversion of a 22-acre Catholic religious campus in West Hartford into a 292-unit apartment development — was completed last fall. The development company recently announced plans to partner with the owner of the Westbrook Outlets in Westbrook to transform

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