UNION SPRINGS - The Union Springs Central School District is giving taxpayers a choice: renovate the historic and condemned Stone Schoolhouse or demolish it.

A small group of 13 Union Springs residents gathered in the library of the district high school Monday evening to learn more about the capital project scheduled for a vote next week, and many of them left with full support for the endeavor.

“Not only does it preserve a significant historic structure in the village, but it's also a financially responsible choice because it costs the taxpayers less,” said Pat Kimber, president of the Frontenac Historical Society in the village.

Using current projection models, Glenn Woodbury, architect and engineer for C&S Engineers, and Marge Robbins, district business administrator, estimate the total cost of the project - renovating the historic schoolhouse to house studies in communications and technology - to be $296,821.

Of that amount, $207,433 was secured in building aid units - the cost of construction of an educational facility by square foot - from the New York State Education Department and $77,888 was secured in EXCEL aid for the technology piece.

The district would borrow the remaining $11,500 with the taxpayers picking up the bill for $20,052 in capitalized interest which will be paid back over 16 years, Robbins said.

Averaged out, the entire community as a whole would have to pay $1,253 per year, she said.

The district will hold a vote on Dec. 11 asking taxpayers to authorize a capital project to renovate the condemned 150-year-old schoolhouse on the middle/high school campus.

If, however, the taxpayers vote against the project, the taxpayers would have to pay $65,000 to $75,000 to demolish the structure, a cost that would entirely be assumed by the district and the taxpayers, said Robbins.

One way or another, the district has to do something with the schoolhouse, formally deemed a fire hazard and an unsafe structure, said Linda Rice, district superintendent.

That designation requires the district to either bring it up to code or demolish it.

Current plans show the building, once made fit for student use, would serve as the district's state-of-the-art media center, housing the current video technology course offered at the middle/high school as well as various other media and communications classes.

Andy Rindfleisch's daughter, Meghan, is currently taking a video production class offered by the district, a program that would be housed in the schoolhouse and expected to expand.

“The communications class is great,” Rindfleisch said. “It just seems like the wave of the future.”

“It's 75 grand to take the building down,” he added, “or 20 grand to have an asset.”

Staff writer Alyssa Sunkin can be reached at alyssa.sunkin@lee.net or 253-5311 ext. 239.