After numerous delays, Pete’s Fresh Market finally owns the property they’re planning to build a grocery store on at Madison Street and Western Avenue, Ald. Bob Fioretti said in an email Thursday evening.

Pete’s closed on the property Thursday, Fioretti said, finally putting it fully in the grocery store’s control.

The store’s progress has been repeatedly delayed. At a meeting in June last year, the store’s manager, Charlie Poulikis, said that if they began construction in 2011, they hoped to open their doors by mid-2012. However, with winter underway, it’s unclear how much construction could be done in the near future.

No groundbreaking date has been set yet.

At an unrelated meeting Wednesday evening, Fioretti called the process to this point “a disaster” and said “everything that could go wrong did go wrong.”

In his email, Fioretti said the project will create approximately 250 construction jobs and 250 permanent retail jobs, with preference for the position going to residents of the current 2nd Ward.