About 45 residents gathered at the Pine Plains Community Center on Dec. 30 to review preliminary plans for a proposed new town hall and to question how — and whether — the project should move forward.
The proposal calls for a new Town Hall on town-owned property at 8–12 North Main St., designed by architectural firm LaBella Associates, with an estimated cost of $4.5 million.
Initial plans from the firm, contracted to design the building in March 2025, show an approximately 80-by-78-foot building with a basement and a multipurpose meeting room designed to seat up to 145 people. The room would also function as a courtroom, with a raised dais and seating for up to nine officials. The design includes offices for town officials, judges’ chambers, and space for the Police Department.
Printed materials available at the public forum included front and side renderings, a schematic of the proposed ground-floor layout, and an overview of space usage at the current town hall. There was no formal presentation of the plans. Instead, Town Board member Matt Zick and Supervisor Brian Walsh invited residents who had signed up to speak to share their comments.
Among the speakers were three former town supervisors: Darrah Cloud, Scott Chase, and Brian Coons.
Cloud noted that the bond on the Pine Plains Library building does not expire until 2045 and said she was concerned about the town taking on additional debt. She recalled former town board member Don Bartles’ goal of keeping town hall in the center of town to help support nearby businesses, but said she would have preferred the current plans to be funded through a grant. Walsh responded that the preliminary design costs were paid for through the town’s building and grounds budget line.
Coons said he was supervisor when the library was designed nearly a decade ago, and suggested that the process suffered from too much input from various firms and designers. He recommended selecting a single designer to take the lead.
Chase warned that financing a new town hall through borrowing would be untenable. A $5 million loan at 3% interest, he said, would require annual payments of $250,000 and a 15% tax increase. “We need grants and donations,” Chase said. He suggested discussions with St. Anthony’s Catholic Church about building affordable housing on its land, which could require a septic system the town might later connect to. “We need to spend the money on sewer first,” he said.
Calls to complete a municipal septic system before moving forward with a town hall project formed a central theme of the meeting.
Efforts to create a shared wastewater solution for Pine Plains’ downtown business district have moved slowly since 2021, limited by cost and land availability. That November, the town reviewed a proposal from engineering firm Tighe & Bond for a centralized septic system estimated at about $4 million before the pandemic, but the plan stalled when the town was unable to identify and acquire suitable land near downtown. In June 2024, Town Board member Kevin Walsh formed an ad hoc wastewater committee, which shifted toward a lower-cost, quadrant-based approach using shared leach fields. Outreach to property owners began in December 2024, but interest was limited, and by March 2025 Walsh said efforts to secure land in two of the four quadrants “did not appear promising.”
“It’s inspirational to dream of town hall. This is a great idea,” resident Catherine Howard said. “But we need to do the septic system and a grocery store first. More businesses will expand the tax base. Some of the options are uncomfortable. But the septic issue has to be resolved.”
Patrick Trettenero, executive director of Stissing Center, said nearby amenities — including Stissing Center, local restaurants and the forthcoming Hudson Company — are already contributing to the town’s economy. He urged officials to consider the relationship between the proposed building and the nearby Graham Brush House, cautioning against crowding it. “Thank you for starting this process,” he said. “First septic, then town hall.”
Several residents focused on functional and design considerations. Pine Plains Planning Board member Ethan DiMaria emphasized the need for improved audio-visual systems. “Stan Hirson videotaped meetings for ten years, but the system we went to since then isn’t good,” he said. DiMaria also noted that New York state offers funding incentives for green buildings, including those with solar arrays. Resident Jeanne Valentine Chase suggested increasing the roof pitch to improve the building’s appearance, while another resident, Sarah Jones, said plans should clearly address use of the basement as well as the ground floor.
Gail Mellow, chair of the Conservation Advisory Council, said she was encouraged to see the project moving ahead. “To get to this point is a big deal. It’s moving forward at a pace we can afford,” she said. “We need to make sure it has everything we need.” Referring to existing trees on the site, she added, “We should build not just parking lots but also parks,” and remarked that the design reminded her of the Napa Auto Parts store in Millerton.
Town Historian Dyan Wapnick and resident Rachel Greenfield advocated for dedicated office and climate-controlled storage space for the Little Nine Partners Historical Society. They said a new town hall could provide space for exhibits of maps and historical documents, noting that there is currently no designated municipal space for town artifacts.
Concerns about financing and timing were also raised repeatedly throughout the meeting. In addition to Cloud, resident Alice Nuccio asked whether there was a timeline for the project.
Zick said there is no timeline. He said the purpose of the preliminary design was to put an idea on paper and gauge public support before determining cost.