A rough draft design of the proposed fire, rescue and police emergency services building the village of Saranac Lake is considering constructing at the site of the former Pius X high school building on Petrova Avenue. (Provided photo — Wendel Five Bugels Design)

SARANAC LAKE — The village of Saranac Lake has officially purchased the former St. Pius X High School building at 33 Petrova Ave. from Citizen Advocates, a major step in the village’s plans to build a combined emergency services building there.

But the controversial plans to build a joint building for the village Police Department, Saranac Lake Volunteer Rescue Squad and Saranac Lake Volunteer Fire Department at this property are still in limbo.

Village Mayor Jimmy Williams said the village signed the contract of sale on Dec. 14.

The sale was announced Monday at a village board meeting, only after Mark Wilson, one of the property’s neighbors who has opposed the village’s building plans, asked about it after hearing about the sale “through the grapevine.”

The sale, which started last February, took the better part of a year to close because Citizen Advocates, which operates an outpatient mental health and addiction clinic on the land, was waiting on the Adirondack Park Agency to approve a subdivision of the property. The APA approved this subdivision in October.

This move split the 21.363-acre parcel of land into two parcels — a 6.274-acre parcel for Citizen Advocates to continue its services on and a 15.089-acre parcel containing the former St. Pius X High School and the Hot House garden center, the latter parcel was sold to the village.

The village agreed to this purchase last February for $350,000, a low price, Williams said.

According to the Franklin County tax map, the total 20-acre property was assessed at a value of $5,568,500 in 2022 and a full market value of $6,629,167.

Just because the village has purchased the land now does not mean the emergency services complex project is guaranteed to happen, Williams said, but since the village has put $40,000 into a study of putting a new emergency service building there, that is what the village is focusing on.

“The closing transpired just before the holidays. Everybody’s kind of getting back to real business,” Williams said. “I think it’s time for discussions to start in terms of ‘what are next steps?'”

He said the village is waiting to see what kind of funding opportunities are available.

“I wish I could say that we are going full speed ahead. But there’s a lot of details to be worked out,” Williams said.

Two years ago, the former village board approved a $2.5 million reserve fund set aside for the emergency services building. So far, the village has spent $165,000 on additional land behind the firehall, $40,000 for the feasibility study and less than $5,000 for a historical study. With the $350,000 purchase of the Petrova Avenue land, the village has spent just under a quarter of that fund.

Citizen Advocates

Citizen Advocates Director of Communications Joe Riccio said this sale marks “the end of an era” for Citizen Advocates, and the start of a new one.

“The location played a key role in establishing Citizen Advocates’ presence in Saranac Lake,” Riccio said in a statement. “Our business has evolved and selling the Petrova property allows Citizen Advocates to deliver new services while remaining a nimble and flexible organization.

“Citizen Advocates will continue to provide the high-quality, lifesaving mental health and addiction services it currently offers from its outpatient clinic adjacent to the former St. Pius X campus, along with community-based services throughout southern Franklin County — and beyond,” he added.

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Hot House lease renewed

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When the sale from Citizen Advocates to the village was announced last year, the future of the Hott House garden store, now the SL Hot House, was a major question for local green thumbs.

An individual investor, Todd Hoffnagle of Lake Clear, put up the capital to purchase the business from Citizen Advocates and signed an eight-month lease lease with the village to rent the greenhouse portion of the property until the end of 2023.

On Dec. 27, the village board renewed this lease for another year, through Dec. 31, 2024, for $1,000 a month.

“We want the Hot House to continue as long as possible,” Williams said. “It’s good for the community. It’s got history. It’s got tradition. It’s a nice asset.”

The Hot House has been open for around 45 years now, first opening in the late 1970s. Last year, Hoffnagle said he put his life savings up with hopes of keeping the garden store growing for years.

Williams said he wants the village to coexist with the garden center for as long as possible.

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Opposition

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There’s been persistent opposition to the village’s plans for the property, primarily from neighbors of the property, but also from other community members who believe there could be better use for it.

Ever since the plans were announced last March, a contingent of neighbors have attended nearly every village board meeting to ask questions about the project and oppose the building plans.

They have a number of concerns — noise, traffic near schools and further proximity from town. Some worry about moving emergency resources from the heart of town and some believe the 33 Petrova property could have better uses for the village, such as housing.

But for several village board members, this site is the only way they see forward to build up-to-date facilities for Saranac Lake’s emergency services.

Opponents to this combined building have said the village should keep the departments where they are and build out at their locations at 100 Broadway and 1-3 Main St.

A $40,000 feasibility study the village commissioned from Wendel Five Bugles Design on the Pius X building did not change much for the opponents of the plans when it was released this fall. They were disappointed the study did not look at expanding the emergency services in their current locations, outside of a few pages.

“We are also gathering more information that we’d like to have expanded upon for the 100 Broadway site,” Williams said on Wednesday.

This does not mean the village is seriously considering expanding the departments at their existing locations. Williams said the village is already convinced that is not feasible. But the public is not convinced. He hopes more information will let people see they don’t have room to expand in their current homes.

The fire department has been looking for a new home since 1971, he said, and the police department building fails every inspection it gets. Williams has called this combined building plan a “100-year solution.”

On Monday, Wilson said the village should have conducted a SEQR review of the project several times before the sale was finalized, as required by the State Environmental Quality Review Act.

“You can not incrementally pursue a project without actually doing an environmental quality review of the entire project at each point,” he said.

Williams said the village attorney and the Wendel engineering firm did a “deep dive” on this topic and told the board they are doing everything properly.

According to state law, “SEQR requires all local, regional, and state government agencies to equally examine the environmental impacts along with the social and economic considerations for a certain project, or action, during their discretionary review. Agencies must follow the multi-step SEQR Decision Process, which requires them to assess the environmental significance of all actions they have the power to approve, fund, or directly assume. If an action consists of multiple phases, sets of activities, or if separate agencies are involved, SEQR requires agencies jointly consider these cumulative impacts during their review. Segmentation of an action into smaller components for an individual review contradicts the intent of the law and may result in legal action.”

The village is looking to abandon its initial plans to build a new access road to connect the property directly to state Route 3 after members of the public said they felt this could constitute a conflict of interest for the village and the state.

The road would have to cross wetlands, which means it would need a permit from the APA allowing the construction in an environmentally sensitive area. Since the APA has plans to move into the 1-3 Main St. building after the police department moves out, they have said it could be a quid pro quo situation.

The village is trying to avoid this entirely by not needing a permit from the APA. But they have not found any other way to get vehicles in and out of the property while keeping them off neighborhood streets yet.

“The feasibility study was done before we asked them to consider options that would not involve a permit,” Williams said. “So, they’ve been working on that.”

The village is scheduling another public information session on its plans. It held one in March last year, and though Williams says not a whole lot has changed since then, he hopes it will clear up “misconceptions” he sees people have about the project.

“Not a lot of new information has become available since our last public information meeting, which sounds crazy,” Williams said. “But it’s the same information we had at that time. So, before significant movement is made we’ll definitely do another informational meeting, but I don’t know if that’s going to be in the next two months or the next five months.”

The village’s feasibility study estimates Pius X as costing $27.5 million to retrofit. Retrofitting the existing emergency services buildings was estimated at costing $43 million.

The feasibility study can be found at tinyurl.com/2p6y9h7z.

Anyone with questions or comments on the plan can email the village clerk at clerk@saranaclakeny.gov. The village plans to post these online and then have engineering firm Wendel Five Bugles Design’s Director of Emergency Services Rob Kryzanowski come in to address them.

This meeting was initially supposed to be held in January, but now Williams said it will likely be months until it is held.