Renovations scaled back due to
budget, timeline
By Polly Mikula
At town meeting day in 2023 voters approved $1.6 million to purchase and renovate the property at 2046 Route 4 to become the new Town Hall (the building that houses the Post Office.)
Now, over a year later, that plan will begin to take shape, albeit not how it was originally envisioned.
“We’re backing off on the scope of renovation,” Town Manager Michael Ramsey explained in an interview April 30. “No bids were formally submitted due to the timeframe in which we were looking, but in a pre-bid meeting, the town received an estimate that was over a million dollars—about twice what we budgeted for,” he said. “So we’re just having to go with a plan B.”
Plan B is to do minimal renovations in-house on the upstairs portion where the town manager and admin staff will be located, such that they can begin to move in June.
That work includes cleaning the carpets, replacing the light fixtures, and moving existing furniture over, Ramsey explained.
For the interim, the clerk’s office and vault will remain at the old town offices.
“What we’re going to do to stay within the budget of $600,000 is to reduce the scope of the project,” Ramsey explained. “We’ll put only the downstairs portion — the clerk’s office and vault — and stairway, back out to bid.”
Original architectural designs were planned out for both upstairs and downstairs renovations.
“It’s not going to be the Taj MaHal,” said Ramsey. “But I’m really excited for the move. We need it. We’re busting at the seams in the office, right now… I’m not against an open floor plan but we’re packed a little too densely,” he added.
As soon as the administrative staff moves into the space above the Post Office, the old town office space on River Road will become available for seniors and the recreation dept. to use, Ramsey said.
“It should be a fluid transition,” he added.
