Preston – A town meeting has been rescheduled to Thursday to authorize town officials to spend a $165,000 state brownfields assessment grant received to assess contaminated areas at the former Norwich Hospital property.

The meeting was postponed from last week, because the legal notice was not published in time. The meeting will be at 7:30 p.m. at Town Hall to approve spending the $165,000 grant from the state Department of Economic and Community Development to assess areas of suspected contaminated soil, Preston Redevelopment Agency Chairman Sean Nugent said.

If the spending is approved by residents Thursday, the assessment work would be done this fall, along with the continued abatement of one of the few remaining buildings on the property before abatement and demolition operations shut down for the winter, Nugent said.

The PRA's demolition contract with Manafort Bros. Inc. runs through September 2016, Nugent said, so the company will maintain its presence at the site, and the firm's security fence will remain in place.

The PRA had hoped to continue demolition work, but the state Bond Commission has not yet acted on the agency's request for a $1.25 million Urban Act grant, and residents at a recent referendum rejected a request for $260,000 in town funds to continue assessing buildings. Nugent said the Bond Commission is not expected to take up the town's request until January.

Nugent said PRA officials are having monthly meetings with officials from the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection, the federal Environmental Protection Agency and the agency's environmental engineering firm, Tighe & Bond, to prepare for getting final state and federal certification for the environmental cleanup that has been done.

“There has been very active and good discussions from all parties,” Nugent said of the two meetings held to date.

c.bessette@theday.com

Twitter: @Bessettetheday