To the editor:

It recently came to my attention that the village of Saranac Lake has already spent or obligated more than $800,000 on the emergency services complex proposed for Petrova Avenue. While these moneys came from reserves carefully built by prior mayoral administrations, my kitchen-table calculation indicated that if the money had come from the general fund, a $300,000 home in Saranac Lake would have had to pay more than $1,000 in additional village taxes.

The emergency services complex is budgeted to cost around $30 million; only a fraction of which has been secured. Where will the rest of the money come from? For discussion, let’s say the village needs to bond for $20 million and is able to secure a bond for 20 years at 0% interest. To pay that money back with general funds, my calculations indicate village taxes on a $300,000 house would need to increase from the roughly $4,000 paid today to nearly $5,400.

The high cost of the project is directly related to the 1.4-acre size of the proposed building. The new facility would incorporate the old St. Pius school. This building is a potentially costly “white elephant.” Cleanup of an old oil spill was already needed. There is also some asbestos in the building. Many buildings of that era also contain lead.

It appears that using the former school as the base of the proposed facility means that the former classrooms must be used for something. In the latest drawing, 20 individual bedrooms, 15 bathrooms and three kitchen/pantry/dining rooms are proposed. It is unclear what the annual cost will be to fill these bedrooms and to maintain these common spaces.

The taxpayers of the village of Saranac Lake and the surrounding towns deserve more information about this proposed facility. Before spending another dime, there should be a public forum about this project and a formal tax impact study should be made available to the public.

Tammara Van Ryn

Saranac Lake