Gardiner School
The building began life as a one-room schoolhouse rolled into the hamlet on logs in 1875. Fifty years later it was one of the few buildings to survive a fire that destroyed many other buildings in the community. It remained in use as a school, expanded to two rooms, until 1981.
The town began using it shortly afterwards, but it served mainly as a meeting place for the town board. Other offices were housed elsewhere in the town, often at the firehouse across the road and an office plaza downtown. In 2000 it was added to the National Register of Historic Places, and the town began to seriously consider renovating and expanding it. Some residents did not believe that was necessary, and helped defeat a $1.5 million expansion plan in a March 2001 vote. A vote later that year limited the town to $850,000 for any renovation or construction.
Three years later, a new town supervisor, Carl Zatz, initiated a project to renovate and expand the building. It caused some controversy when other town officials and residents publicly expressed doubts that the work could be done for the minimal costs Zatz claimed it would. It was completed for what Zatz's Democratic Party says was less than budgeted. Republican opponents, however, criticized him for destroying the school's outhouse in the process.
See also
References
- ^ Horrigan, Jeremiah (July 8, 2004). "Town Hall gets new lease on life". Times-Herald Record. Retrieved 2007-09-16.
- ^ Snel, Alan (August 9, 2001). "Gardiner trims back plan to rehabilitate Town Hall". Times-Herald Record. Retrieved 2007-09-16.
- ^ "Accomplishments of the Democratic Team's First Term". Archived from the original on 2008-11-21. Retrieved 2007-09-16.
- ^ "Supervisor Zatz Allows Historic Outhouse to be Trashed". Archived from the original on 2008-07-23. Retrieved 2007-09-16.