Amazon will fund a proposed warehouse and distribution facility in Hermon at a shuttered drive-in theater, according to a Department of Environmental Protection filing.
The document mentions Amazon once, saying the applicant, SPA Properties, is applying on behalf of the online retailer. The cost for the development at 1674 Hammond St. is projected at $17.5 million, according to the application, which was filed last month.
Town Manager Stephen Fields said he couldn’t share any information about the project.
“Amazon is writing the narrative. We aren’t,” Fields said.
Hermon officials are tight-lipped about the proposed warehouse, which was first reported by WABI but did not cite any sources, either named or anonymous. Secrecy appears to be a common feature of such projects, as Amazon’s facility in Caribou and proposed warehouse in Gorham both featured months of confidential discussions between the online retailer and town officials before becoming public.
An Amazon spokesperson did not provide a comment on the Hermon warehouse.
Hermon’s Economic Development Director Scott Perkins said Friday there is no confirmation that Amazon is behind the warehouse.
Sometimes, towns aren’t told exactly who is building a development and hire outside companies to check ordinances or complete permitting, he said.
To keep information about a company coming to an area under wraps, towns can be the last to know who exactly is developing a site, Perkins said.
“They want to hold things close to the vest while they’re going through permitting processes and everything else. We sometimes are the very last ones to know everything,” he said.
Perkins said he did not know what stage the permitting process was in.
Plans for the warehouse were shared during a public hearing in a June planning board meeting. Amazon was not named or mentioned in the meeting.
The warehouse and distribution center will be built on roughly 20 acres and be used as staging for deliveries across Greater Bangor, said Aaron Hunter, a civil engineer with Sebago Technics who presented the plans.
Sebago Technics presented the plans on behalf of SPA Properties.
Loading docks and spaces for delivery vans will wrap around the building, Hunter said. There will be 365 parking spaces.
Hunter did not know how many employees would work at the facility, he said at the meeting.
The site previously housed the Bangor Drive-In, which closed in 2022.
