By Tom Grace
Cooperstown News Bureau
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NEW BERLIN _ More than 2½ years after it was condemned, a building at the corner of Genesee and North Main streets in New Berlin may soon come down.
"What we're waiting for now is for the state to pass a budget," New Berlin Village Trustee Robert Starr said Thursday.
The state has promised the village a Restore New York grant of about $160,000 to remove the building, which was condemned and vacated in January 2008. But the funds have not arrived and won't until the state adopts a 2010-2011 budget, Starr said.
"A number of contractors have said they would be interested in removing the building, but we don't want to move on this until we have the money," he said.
The 19th-century brick building, with recessed doorways and large shop windows, was once an important part of the village's commercial district. Situated at the four corners in the center of the village, the first floor housed a number of businesses, including Dyke's Drug Store and more recently, Trash & Treasure. The upper stories were conveniently situated apartments.
In recent decades however, the structure has fallen into disrepair and bricks have been falling off the facade.
After the building was condemned, village officials worked with owners Kenneth and Monica George of Morris to have it either fixed up or torn down. Starr said the Georges were cooperating with the village, but lost the building to Chenango County for nonpayment of property taxes.
According to E.J. Von Dauber of the county Office of Real Property Tax Services, the Georges owed the county about $28,920 for the years 2006-2009, when the property was offered at auction in June.
Starr said village officials had hoped to avoid buying the building but were advised by county officials it would be sold to the highest bidder.
To avoid further complications, the village bid $10,000 for the building and, as the sole bidder, acquired it.
The state grant apparently will not reimburse the village for purchasing the property, nor for emergency repairs made in the last two years to stabilize the structure, Starr said.
"We've already got about $20,000 in this project," he said.
Because the building is part of the New Berlin Historic District, the village needed permission from state and federal historic officials to have it removed.
Earlier this year, village Mayor Wade Schrag met with Kenneth Markunas, historic sites restoration coordinator with the State Historic Preservation Office, to make sure the building could be razed.
"We actually took him through the building, and showed him all of the problems," Schrag said at the time. "After this meeting, NYS Historic Preservation agreed verbally to allow us to demolish the building."
Starr said that all that's needed now is the money.
