To: The Town of Walden Board
From: Concerned Residents of the Town of Walden
Re: The McCoy Property and relocating the Town Hall
We, the undersigned, request that the Walden Town Board stop all further expenditures on the McCoy Property project until the Board conducts open meetings to discuss our concerns about how best to proceed with spending more tax dollars on the McCoy property. Since the fiscal year began July 1st the board has spent $79,700 and authorized an additional $19,200 at the 9/9/14 board for architectural drawings just for the McCoy house. This does not include costs for architectural drawings done in previous years. The total expenditure for the McCoy property rehabilitation is over $750,000 to date, considering property acquisition and maintenance and improvements over the past 10 years.
Our concerns:
We are a town of approximately 1900 residents in 800 households with an annual town budget of $950,000 and the approved town budget calls for at least another $600,000 to be spent this year on the rehabilitation of the McCoy house. This would bring total expenditures on the McCoy property to $1,350,000 or approximately $1,700 per household.
Why move the Walden Town Hall that has served the town exceedingly well, is only 22 years old, and has limited resale value? Moving the town hall will also require the dismantling of the Pumpkin Patch at its current location.
Why move the Pumpkin Patch, a playground designed by a nationally recognized architect for the unique terrain of its present location. The success of the playground is attested to by the visits by many children and families each year. $200,000 was raised and thousands of voluntary man-hours expended some 20 years ago to build the Pumpkin Patch with only $10,000 provided by the town.
We feel the Town Board has primary responsibility to the residents for: fire and police protection, roads and streets, signage, and street lighting, including maintenance, minor modifications, and new work requested by the Town residents.
Maintaining the Bachman Community Center and the Pumpkin Patch Park clearly are higher priorities, yet both have received meager funding in the last several years.
If the Pumpkin Patch Park needs repairs for insurance requirements, that should be done immediately. Moving the Park will no doubt be a very long process, we should not wait for that to unfold.
The Bachman Community Center is serving the community needs and has considerable resident use. Repairing that building, guided by the Bachman Board, is certainly a higher priority.
The WRES is our primary resource for home fires and emergency response. They have specific equipment needs that certainly rank higher than fixing an old home.
If there are those in the community who have a passion for the McCoy Property, they need to form a citizens group, raise funds and develop a strategic and business plan for how they would rehabilitate, maintain, operate, and control the property and grounds. Both the Pumpkin Patch and the Bachman Community Center were started in this way. If the Town wants to match funds with a citizens group, that certainly could be considered if a majority of the Town residents support that idea.