Economic climate, cost increases
doom project

The Somers Town Board has voted against putting a $20 million-plus community center bond proposal up for a vote in November after a drastic jump in the cost of the project.
The vote, taken at Thursday night’s board meeting, followed an updated cost assessment from the project’s construction company that found the cost of the project had skyrocketed with the rising cost of fuel and construction materials.

“I’m in favor of the project, but I can’t in good conscience ask the people of Somers to vote for it,” said Councilman George Dieter.

The proposed center would house an indoor pool, several activity rooms, a gym with locker rooms and a conference center. An alternate plan would add an outdoor pool that would increase the price by about $1 million.

The outdoor pool had been a major selling point for some town residents, with many coming to the public hearings to speak out specifically in favor of the extra pool.
The community center’s estimated cost went from $19 million to $20.7 million for a center without an outdoor pool, and from $24.5 million to $27.8 million with the outdoor pool. The drastic jump in price left council members with little hope the vote would pass under the current economic conditions.

Dieter said he had spent a recent morning in front of the town post office asking citizens how they felt about the project and found that many were either unaware of the project or against it.
Supervisor Mary Beth Murphy agreed with Dieter’s assessment, as did Councilmen Richard Clinchy and Thomas Garrity.

“There’s no chance that at $24 million that it will pass,” Garrity said.
The only vote in favor of putting the bond before the public came from Councilman Paul Meyer, who agreed with the other council members at the beginning of Thursday night’s discussion but eventually turned toward favoring the vote.

“This is something well needed here,” Meyer explained. “It’s a big hole in the services the town provides; something neighboring towns have but we don’t.”

Meyer said the time was as good as any to move forward on the project since construction costs weren’t getting any cheaper and the project wouldn’t start being paid off until 2010.
Murphy said the town will look into ways to build the center in stages, with a more Spartan building that could be added onto later.

But Russell A. Davidson of the architectural firm KG&D, which designed the center, said while that idea is feasible it wouldn’t be logical to come in later and add things after all the ground work had been done on the property.

“It wouldn’t make sense to tear it up all over again,” he said. “They wouldn’t want to spend money twice.”

Davidson said he understood that even though the project would be paid off over 30 years, residents would still have a hard time swallowing the bill in light of the current economy.
“It’s frustrating for everyone involved, but everyone is nervous about the economy,” Davidson said.

Somers residents have rejected similar projects several times in the past, and just a few months ago narrowly turned down a $9.5 million bond that would have helped refurbish the town library.

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