Article reprinted with permission of the Times Union. Article first published on November 04, 2005.

New chapter in library project

Final steel tops off new Clifton Park building; officials are working to remove last hurdle

by Dennis Yusko, Staff writer

Things are looking up at the new Clifton Park-Halfmoon Public Library.

Optimism soared Friday at the topping-off ceremony of the $15 million facility. A crane lifted the last piece of steel atop the structure's skeletal frame on an exquisite autumn morning, and library trustees hinted they were close to resolving one of the project's last nagging hurdles.

About three dozen library officials and planners gathered in hard hats off Moe Road. They signed the large beam of steel with markers before hauling it skyward. The crowd watched as workers lowered the beam in place, marking the formal ending of the project's steelwork.

Crews already laid the 55,000-square-foot concrete foundation. The facility's roof will go up this month, exterior walls will be built in November.

"We faced many challenges and obstacles ... but we overcame those obstacles," said Christene Thurston, president of the library's board of trustees, in an impassioned introduction standing atop a collection of aluminum shingles.

There have been many roadblocks, but perhaps the biggest remaining issue for the library to solve involves acquiring an easement for a small piece of property across the street from the 11-acre site so a turning lane can be built into the facility.

The owners of the property, the Spaulding family, has refused to sell only the roughly 900-square-foot easement. Failure to acquire the land would require the board of trustees to purchase the entire 2-acre property, redesign the entire project or meet with town officials for assistance.

But the Spauldings are reconsidering their all-or-nothing stance, and an agreement on the easement could happen soon, library spokesman Dave Golden said in an interview just before the library's last piece of steel was moved.

"It looks like we're going to have a solution. The owners expressed a willingness to negotiate. Hopefully, we'll be able to work something out," Golden said.

Purchasing the easement costs the library, but it would be far less expensive then redesigning the entire road, he said.

Members of the Spaulding family could not be reached.

Friday's ceremony was long in coming.

District residents came out in record numbers last September to approve the new library after rejecting a similar proposal in September 2003.

"After the referendum, we thought all our problems were over, but it was just a preview," Thurston joked on Friday.

Earlier this year, the library's board of trustees faced a lawsuit from nonunion shops for choosing to build the new facility with mostly union labor. A Saratoga County judge has so far sided with the library in that case.

In September, library trustees announced that archaeologists discovered several artifacts dating to 4,000-6,000 B.C. while performing a mandated environmental study of the land. Five Native American or pre-Native American arrowheads and rock shavings dating to the Middle Archaic Period were found on three acres of the site, just south of the library's footprint.

The discovery should not delay the project, which figures to be completed within a year.

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