OXFORD — A local developer is mulling plans to renovate an unoccupied end of Robinson’s Mill into luxury apartments for the elderly. 

Chuck Starbird said in a phone interview Wednesday he intends to create a small, enclosed community for individuals ages 55 years and older in the former woolen mill on the shores of Thompson Lake. 

The proposal was presented to the Planning Board earlier this spring but has not been approved by local or state authorities. 

Moving forward with the plan, Starbird said, hinges on whether sewer lines that are to be installed on King Street later this year are extended as far as the mill. 

To date, the town has plans to extend the sewer lines just beyond the mill to the Robinson’s Marina, though a final end location has not been determined, Town Manager Michael Chammings said. 

The plan comes a year and a half after the town sold the site to Starbird for $32,000 after it foreclosed on the former Robinson Manufacturing Co. in 2009 following nonpayment of $244,920 in property taxes accrued over three years.

According to Sun Journal records, the woolen mill was built around 1840 and once employed hundreds of workers during the region’s manufacturing heyday. 

After the mill closed in 2004, plans to redevelop the property into residential condominiums and commercial space, including restaurants and a textile museum, floundered and the town placed liens on the site for unpaid taxes. 

Starbird’s plan calls for at least five 1,200-square foot condos built inside the east end of the building along an outflow stream from Thompson Lake Dam into the Little Androscoggin River. 

A winding, dirt driveway has already been staked out from King Street to a large garage door. Two single-family homes have already been built outside near the proposed site and are for sale.

Starbird said the cost of that work, plus exterior renovations placing siding on the mill, was about $400,000. 

Interior renovations could cost millions of dollars, he said. 

Starbird said town officials have been instrumental in getting the project to progress forward. 

“They’re interested in making this happen and turning it from an eyesore into something presentable,” he said.

“We’ll see what the market holds,”  he said.