Open House For Leesburg Town Hall Set For MondayLEESBURG – A project three years in the making will be open to the public for the first time next week.
An open house at the renovated Leesburg Town Hall is planned for 6 p.m. Monday.
“(The building) will not only be welcoming, but will meet all the requirements” for ADA compliance, said Christina Archer, Leesburg Town Council president.
The building had been out of compliance for may years, Archer said, as was the town clerk-treasurer’s office.
The new town hall is fully ADA-compliant, with a ground floor meeting room, the new clerk-treasurer’s office, and handicapped accessible men’s and women’s restrooms.
Groundbreaking on the $160,000 project began in October, but it took a lot of planning to get to that stage.
“We did not want to put ramps on our historic building, and to build a new property would be extremely expensive,” Archer said.
The town worked with Barr Design Group in Goshen, which specializes in historical renovations, Archer said.
The new town hall fills the space where the town’s parking garage was. Before that, it was the Leesburg Fire Department. The old fire truck and pumper truck “were small enough that they could drive underneath the building and park,” Archer said.
The old driveway off Pearl Street was also incorporated into the new building.
Archer said Butt and Timmons Construction of Syracuse was able to find bricks to closely match the old building. And street superintendent Craig Charlton created an attractive landing to the west of the new meeting room using old bricks from Leesburg’s famed brick streets.
Archer and Craig Allen are working to create a museum in the old town hall space. The museum will have some regular hours and possibly “by appointment” hours like the Pound Store in Oswego. Archer said they’re hoping the museum will be open by the end of the summer, and said if anyone has pictures or memorabilia relating to Leesburg, they may contact her at 956-975-6842.
The Leesburg Town Hall is at 102 Pearl St. The open house with refreshments will be followed by the town council’s regular monthly meeting at 6:30 p.m.
