Franklin is looking to grow its downtown. Liberty Utilities’s gas capacity is posing a problem.

The space in the heart of Franklin’s downtown, a former department store, excited Patrick McDevitt with its potential.

It had high ceilings, weathered red brick and grand windows overlooking Central Street. McDevitt and his wife, Kristine, thought it would be a perfect space for a condominium.

Their family has lived in Hanover for the past 20 years, but with their children out of the house, the McDevitts wanted to find a new place to call home. “We started looking for a place that we could find an up-and-coming, a little bit edgy, walkable neighborhood, and Franklin kind of fit the bill,” he said.

Three years ago, they bought the space and got to work. McDevitt spent hundreds of hours putting in insulation, replacing the floorboards and configuring the electrical wiring in the 2,800 square-foot area. Structural wood beams now make up the bones of the three-bedroom space, which still remains empty except for unopened appliances and power tools.

One step put an unexpected halt construction: turning on the gas.

In December, McDevitt called Liberty Utilities, which services Franklin and the rest of the Lakes Region with gas, to install a meter. They said no.

“I just kept thinking, surely they’ve misunderstood my request,” he said. “I kept saying, ‘No, this is a residence. It’s just a three-bedroom residence in the center of the downtown district of Franklin.’ And they said, ‘Yep, the answer is no.'”

Unbeknownst to McDevitt, the city of Franklin or the rest of the Lakes Region, Liberty had placed a moratorium on adding new customers due to a lack of capacity. The freeze has forced projects in Franklin’s downtown, which has seen steady development in recent years, to pause or scramble for alternatives.

Liberty built its original six-inch, 22-mile pipeline from Concord to Tilton in the 1960s, but unexpected growth in the Lakes Region in the 70s and 80s tested capacity. Liberty built a plant in Tilton around that time to supplement the line and offset costs in winter.

The company considered increasing the line’s size from six inches to 12 in the early 2000s, and it did so for the first 12 miles without ever completing construction. Expanding the remaining 10 miles could take between five to seven years.

“[This is] an issue that, by their own admission, they knew about in the 1980s and never finished the pipeline,” said David Chunn, Franklin’s planning and zoning director. “And then knowing that it may be an issue, just for whatever reason, chose to not notify any of us.”

The issue only came to the attention of Franklin’s city leadership because of McDevitt’s experience.

Laconia, Tilton, Northfield and Gilford also discovered the issue recently and commented on its negative effects to their own developments.

An old Regal Theater on Central Street is in the midst of being reimagined as a hotel, but fear of disconnecting from gas has delayed the project. Soldier’s Memorial Hall will soon be renovated and will switch from gas packs to electric.

“It’s inhibiting not only the creation of housing units during a housing crisis, but also the creation of jobs, the economic mobility, redevelopment of certain areas, including Franklin. It’s a hindrance,” Chunn said.

Below McDevitt’s space downtown is another residential space owned by Brian Mank. The moratorium was not yet in place when Mank purchased his condo five years ago, and at first, he thought his upstairs neighbor’s issue was a simple “misunderstanding.”

Mank is a part of a small group of residents that are working to revitalize downtown Franklin with the hope of buying a block of buildings and renovating them into apartments to attract more people and businesses.

“I’m for the city of Franklin. I want to see the economic development continue, want to be part of the revitalization of this community,” he said. “But now it’s going to be at a snail’s pace. It’s going to be stalled.”

Pamela Bellings, regional communications specialist for Liberty, said in a statement that the utility notified the New Hampshire Department of Energy and the Office of the Consumer Advocate in July 2024 about placing the moratorium. Liberty expects to seek permits in 2027 and begin construction on the expanded pipeline once approved.

“The Company will begin preliminary engineering in the coming months to evaluate options for addressing the issue,” she said. “Liberty will continue working with regulators and stakeholders to identify the safest and most cost-effective solution for supply challenges in its northern division.”

In 2022, Liberty budgeted $20.8 million to expand the 10-mile stretch over 2026 and 2027, according to filings from the Public Utilities Commission.

But Consumer Advocate Donald Kreis said the company has not deployed that money yet.

“I think that Liberty Utilities is a poorly managed, under capitalized utility,” he said. “Neither Unitil nor Eversource would get caught flat-footed like this, I’m quite confident.”

Kreis said since Liberty is an investor-owned utility, the Commission and the Department of Energy do not have many ways to hold the company accountable, especially given the right-to-reject clause in its tariff.

Conversations around the issue have happened as early as Dec. 4 during a Tilton select board meeting and as recently as a roundtable discussion in Franklin with Rep. Maggie Goodlander, officials from Franklin and Laconia and a representative from Liberty. No immediate solutions emerged from those meetings.

McDevitt has brought his case to the Public Utilities Commission and asked to be granted an exception to the moratorium. He said he wants to wait as long as he can before resorting to propane or electric.

“I’m afraid that we’re a little bit on the leaning edge of this, because still we talk to people who are surprised and are sure that we’ve gotten this wrong,” he said. “Everyone except Liberty has been super helpful and surprised and eager to try to figure this out.”