Joe Moore spreads water over rows of baby plants in the Hhott House greenhouse in April 2022. (Enterprise photo — Aaron Marbone)

SARANAC LAKE — The Hhott House garden store will continue to operate. An individual investor is putting up the capital to purchase the business and has signed a lease with the village to rent the greenhouse portion of the property, which the village recently purchased with plans to construct a new emergency services building there.

In late January, the village of Saranac Lake announced plans to buy land on Petrova Avenue from Citizen Advocates for the new emergency services building. Citizen Advocates will retain the outpatient mental health and addiction clinic, transportation facility and adult supportive services building at the site. It is selling the former St. Pius X High School building and Hhott House Greenhouse to the village. Citizen Advocates also owns and operates the Hhott House Greenhouse. This put the future of the Hhott House in limbo, but Todd Hoffnagle of Lake Clear is pursuing purchasing the business to keep it going under his ownership. He said he has put his life savings up with hopes of keeping the garden store growing for years.

On Monday, he signed an eight-month lease with the village to rent the property for through the rest of the year. In 2024, the garden center may need a new location, but it’s possible it could stay where it is, depending on the village’s design plans for a combined home for the village Police Department, Saranac Lake Volunteer Rescue Squad and the Saranac Lake Volunteer Fire Department.

The sale of the property has been a bit controversial among some village residents and those in the Petrova neighborhood. Residents have voiced concerns in board meetings and letters to the Enterprise about environmental impacts of wetlands at the property, traffic changes on state Route 3, moving emergency services from the heart of town and the future of the Hhott House.

The Hhott House has been open for around 44 years now, first opening in the late 1970s. Village Mayor Jimmy Williams said the board recognized the value of the business and that they wanted to keep it open if possible.

Williams said this lease lets everyone evaluate where they are at while not in a growing season.

The Hhott House was just gearing up for the coming planting season when news of the village’s plans came to light. This lease allows them to keep doing business there through the end of the year, Williams said.

Then, when the lease is up, they can reevaluate their plans next year, he said. There is a provision in the lease that the village may extend the lease when it is up. But that depends on what the final footprint for the emergency services building looks like, Williams said. The engineering and design studies have not begun yet, so Williams said they can’t really know if keeping the Hhott House is possible.

“In a perfect world” they’d be able to stay right where they are, Hoffnagle said, but that “100% depends on the village plans.”

According to the lease, Hoffnagle will pay the village $1,000 per month for the property and also pay 75% of the electrical and water/sewer bills.

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Hhott commodity

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Last fall, Hoffnagle left an advertising agency he had been with for 20 years. He was searching for his next endeavor. He’s originally from the area, moved away and had moved back with his wife and three kids. He said he wanted to find a business that needed a new influx of money and energy.

“Now, owning a greenery? Was that what I was after? Not necessarily,” he said. “But being an entrepreneur in this town has always been of interest to me.”

In February, he read in the Enterprise about the sale of the property and the uncertain future of the Hhott House. And he saw the heaps of comments on social media of local green thumbs mourning the potential loss of their supplier, what he sees as an “anchor business.”

“We have received so much support from the community,” Hhott House Manager Lou Reuter said. “We’re unique.”

“For around 10 years of my life I lived right on Lake Street up the road from the Hhott House,” Hoffnagle said. “I frequented it. Used to walk my golden retrievers and kiddos through the property.”

“He came in to me and told me he was interested in doing it,” Reuter said — on the same week he and the community learned of the pending property sale.

Reuter started working at the Hhott House in 1988 and has worked seasonally or full-time ever since then.

“That’s one half of my life I’ve been involved with them,” Reuter said.

He left a job as a senior sports reporter at the Enterprise in 2021 to help keep the nursery open when it needed a manager. He said he cares a lot about the garden center.

“If I didn’t care about it I certainly wouldn’t have taken the job two years ago,” Reuter said

Hoffnagle is still negotiating the sale price of the business with Citizen Advocates as it assesses the value of its assets.

“I don’t have a lot of backing. This is my life savings I’m throwing at this,” Hoffnagle said.

It’s all money he and his wife have saved up. It’s a bit scary getting into this, he said, but he sees it as an important business that can earn money and give back.

Hoffnagle doesn’t expect much profit in this first season, but he’s hoping this is a business he can run for years and years. He’s already thinking about handing it down to his children.

“My hope is to keep it open uninterrupted,” Hoffnagle said. “The details need to be ironed out as to when that literally goes from Citizen Advocates to me.”

Reuter said he can start buying supplies immediately, but there are spring preparations that should have been done “yesterday.”

Reuter will still do the hiring, the buying, the selling; all the garden center work. Hoffnagle will handle the business end.

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Property under contract

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The village board also voted to approve the purchase of 15 acres of the Petrova Avenue property from Citizen Advocates for $350,000 on Monday. Part of what sold the village on this parcel was the price, Trustee Matt Scollin had said.

The land has been subdivided, with around 15 acres for the village and around 5 staying with Citizen Advocates.

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. On Tuesday, Williams said he was near-speechless over the value of the property they got at such a low price.

The village had previously been looking at combining its emergency services departments at the SLVFD firehall on Broadway. Though the Broadway location had lots of perks and love, Williams said it just would not work.

Williams said the village’s feasibility study showed even with the SLVRS property, the SLVFD property, the 0.40 acre parcel of land behind the current firehall the village bought for $165,000 last spring and the hypothetical purchase of another property on Broadway, the land would still be not big enough for all three entities.

“We threw the kitchen sink at it and they just won’t fit,” Williams said.

He said the fire department is supposed to have 30,000 square feet for its firehall according to fire department code. It currently has 8,000.

A big part of what needs to happen to allow the building to be there is direct vehicle access to state Route 3. But there are federal wetlands in the area. Williams said if they can’t build a road there, then they can’t build an emergency services building there. It would just be village owned property.

Some residents were concerned over the environmental impact of the building.

Williams clarified that Monday’s was not a vote on building the emergency services building. It was a decision to purchase the land for a potential building.

Last week, the village amended its zoning code to allow a new definition for an “emergency services building.” Previously, all three entities were zoned separately.

Last year, the former village board approved a $2.5 million reserve fund set aside for the emergency services building. So far, Scollin said they have spent $165,000 on the land behind the firehall, between $35,000 and $40,000 for the feasibility study and less than $5,000 for the historical study. With the $350,000 purchase of the Petrova Avenue land, the village has spent just under a quarter of that fund.

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CLARIFICATION: This article has been updated to clarify that Citizen Advocates is selling the Petrova Avenue property to the village but is retaining the outpatient mental health and addiction clinic, transportation facility and adult supportive services building at the site.