MONTICELLO – The Sullivan County Legislature is closing the door on the last four years and opening a new door to five new legislators starting terms alongside four returning lawmakers in the new year. 

The current Legislature held their final full board meeting of this term on Thursday, December 21, in which 65 of 67 resolutions were passed unanimously. The other two resolutions, number 22 and number 23, were tabled and will be up to the incoming legislature to handle. 

The first resolution tabled regarded filling vacancies on the Sunset Lake Local Development Corporation. This resolution was carried at the Health and Human Services Committee on Thursday, December 14. District 2 Legislator Nadia Rajsz proposed the motion to table this resolution, which was put through by a 5-4 vote. 

This resolution was also brought up during public comment, during which commenter Ken Walter said it should be up to the next Legislature to decide on filling vacancies at Sunset Lake. 

The second resolution to be tabled was for the authorization of a sale of property on Bushnell Avenue in the Village of Monticello, which was the former Sullivan County Jail. Introduced by Chairman of the Legislature, Robert Doherty, and Chair of the Management and Budget Committee, George Conklin, the county determined that they have no official use for the property. The county has thus elected to make the property available for economic development upon sale of the property, and the purchase price is listed at $100,000.

Developer Mendel Stern has expressed interest in purchasing the property and developing housing, after the current facility is demolished. 

District 6 Legislator Luis Alvarez opened it up for discussion, as he questioned who is going to demolish the facility. 

County Attorney Michael McGuire said that according to the discussions that have been undertaken, the purchaser will take the property as is and will be responsible to demolish and prepare the building pad on their expense. 

“I think the demolition of the building is going to cost a fortune,” Alvarez said. “I’d say that this is a good deal for the county.”

Outgoing District 8 Legislator Ira Steingart insisted that the property be demolished within a set time frame that the county sets. 

McGuire said that if the purchaser takes the property, they will take it as is, and it will go on the tax roll in March 2024. 

“They are very reluctant to agree to any kind of time frame and certainly not agree to anything reverting back to the county, for obvious reasons,” McGuire said. “They don’t know how long it’s going to take to get it down. They don’t know how long it’s going to take to get approval from the village to get architects to design a new facility.”

Steingart said that there is no reason that the building can’t be taken down first, before the purchaser starts their architectural design. 

“I realize there may be issues with what’s in the building that it takes time to do it,” said Steingart. “But I think we have to have something in there so it doesn’t just sit there for 20 years. Once we give it to someone else, we can’t control that.”

Steingart also said that he wouldn’t vote for the resolution unless there was some kind of stipulation on how long they have to demolish and complete the plans for the new building. 

According to Department of Public Works (DPW) Commissioner Edward McAndrew, the cost to demolish the property would be in the range of 2 to 3 million dollars. 

“It is not a cheap removal,” McAndrew said. “It will take years to remove, probably more than two years. It will take six months to a year to create a demo plan alone. There’s a lot to that building.”

McAndrew also said that the first step is bringing in an architect or engineer to design the dismantling of the building. He said that it will involve large cranes, and it is in the center of a tight lot. 

McGuire said that the potential purchaser is not happy about the current terms because they aren’t sure of what they are walking into. But he said that if the county were to take the property back, they would receive $100,000 and spend $3 million to take it down.

“This isn’t prime property for economic development,” McGuire said. “This is a prime property for a 3 million dollar bill to the county. Even then, it is a very difficult building pad to build on, because it is literally the side of a cliff.”

McGuire said that he could go back to them to say that the deal has to be conditioned, but that the purchaser would probably come back with a number around 10 years for completion. 

“They don’t even know what they are building yet,” he said. 

Outgoing District 9 Legislator Alan Sorensen stated that he would like to see the old jail site be turned into a youth center. 

“I think this is going to be another Apollo Plaza [abandoned mall plaza in Monticello] where it’s sitting there, decaying,” Sorensen said. “There is a dramatic need for a center of learning and activities for the youth in the Monticello area. I’d much prefer to see the county invest dollars into a learning youth facility…we never talk about investing in our youth.”

The move to table was brought forward by District 7 Legislator Joe Perrello and seconded by Rasjz. The agreement to table the resolution was voted through, 5-4.