323-acre Rutland home marketed by EcoTarium is slated to be camp for small children
WORCESTER — The EcoTarium museum of science and nature sold 323 acres of mostly wooded land in Rutland to a personal buyer for $400,000.
The land includes a 7-acre pond and 15 structures from a former camp employed for academic purposes.
The customer is “intrigued in reviving the outdated ecological camp on the home,” said Keith Ross of LandVest, Inc., the broker for the deal.
“It will be a camp for children,” said Kerry Castorano, vice president of institutional advancement and instruction for the EcoTarium.
According to Ross, state restrictions on the assets limit the land’s use.
“It are not able to be utilised as residential,” he reported.
The EcoTarium, situated at 222 Harrington Way in Worcester, declared final week that it will reopen its outdoor reveals, trails and grounds to the community April 23 after staying closed for above seven months.
Past summertime, it had cited the significant money effects of the COVID-19 pandemic for closing Sept. 4, with the outcome of a decline of staff members positions.
Attendance experienced been down virtually 90%. The EcoTarium experienced shut March 13 very last year since of the pandemic and had a minimal reopening of its outdoor grounds June 4.
Having said that, Castorano said the sale was “not in reaction to that (financial outcomes) immediately.”
The EcoTarium had applied the residence as a summer months camp but the excursion from Worcester to the camp “grew to become prohibitive” and the camp hasn’t been working for quite a few decades.
The EcoTarium “was not employing the land” and was “mulling in excess of what to do with the land,” Castorano explained.
“It just hadn’t been used for a extended time, which is unlucky for the reason that it really is a gorgeous assets,” she explained.
Despite the fact that the EcoTarium has been closed, it has been supplying an array of programing on the web.
In the meantime, with the April 23 reopening in perspective, the EcoTarium has been putting up positions and hiring people again.
The 323-acre Rutland home is on Sassawanna Road, off Route 56. It was listed for sale previous April and bought for $400,000 on March 12.
The purchaser is stated as Sassawanna Lake LLC, according to the Worcester Registry of Deeds.
According to a description of the property, it was gifted to what is now the EcoTarium in 1950 and became the Daniels Forestry Camp, educating learners in the realistic and theoretical foundations of forestry and environmental get the job done.
The camp ongoing until eventually the mid-1960s, when several structures ended up created to assist the instruction packages. Fifteen of individuals buildings remain, “in lousy condition.”
In 1981, a conservation restriction was marketed above the property to the point out that prohibits any new residential advancement, but it does permit for the renovation, mend and substitute of the current buildings and the infrastructure that supports it.
“The residence has to be employed for an academic goal,” Ross said. “It really is a good location for ecological instruction.”
There were a whole lot of inquiries about the residence from people today searching to farm the spot or other needs that did not meet the requirements, he stated.
“The EcoTarium’s been a great steward of the property,” he explained. “It truly is a bought a range of uplands and wetlands.”
The description explained there “are excellent trails throughout the property and it abuts 1000’s of acres of conserved land.”
Castorano reported that the EcoTarium is glad that the customer of the Rutland property will use it for small children.
