Deal near on Albany demolition 
Historic facade may be saved 

By MARNIE EISENSTADT
Gazette Reporter

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ALBANY - A dispute between Albany County and the Historic Albany Foundation over a half-demolished building is nearing resolution, after being batted back and forth in the court system for almost two years.

Albany County began to demolish the 157-year-old house at 41 Ten Broeck St. in August 2000, but was stopped by the courts after the city of Albany and the foundation filed a lawsuit alleging that the county did not get the proper approvals to tear the building down. Before the county began demolishing the house, all three parties had been discussing how it could be saved.

But now a deal between the Historic Albany Foundation and the county is in the works. A resolution to give the building to the foundation, along with $125,000 to fix the facade, went before the Legislature on Monday night. But the item was sent back to that body's Audit and Finance Committee because some legislators and several neighbors want the county to give Historic Albany more money to fix the front of the building. The back is mostly demolished and unsalvageable.

Neighbors who addressed the Legislature on Monday night said it would take $195,000 to stabilize and restore 2½ stories of the 3½-story facade. The foundation also would have to treat and stabilize the two walls the building shares with the adjacent houses - 39 and 43 Ten Broeck St.

Elizabeth Griffin, executive director of the Historic Albany Foundation, said the group wants to settle as quickly as possible, before the building deteriorates any further.

"The only way to make it safe is to settle," Griffin said. She said neighbors of the house and the foundation are concerned about children getting into the back of 41 Ten Broeck, which is open to the elements, and getting hurt.

Griffin said the foundation could do the bare minimum with $125,000, but $195,000 would probably cover everything needed to stabilize the facade and leave some money for unforseen problems, which are likely with a building that has been left exposed to two winters.

Neighbors of 41 Ten Broeck St. who came to the meeting of the Legislature on Monday night chastised the county for leaving the building the way it is.

"I am appalled that this body representing Albany County and the county executive are so unwilling to lend a neighbor a hand," said Helen Black, who lives up the street from the historic house. She moved into the neighborhood because of its historical significance, but soon after she moved in, the county began knocking down 41 Ten Broeck.

Black urged legislators to offer $195,000 to Historic Albany.

Legislator Wanda Willingham, D-Albany, a sponsor of the resolution to give 41 Ten Broeck St. to the foundation, said the county should have put up the money to fix the building when the issue first went to the courts.

"It is our fault it has grown to the amount it is," Willingham said. She, too, said the county should offer the foundation $195,000 to fix what is left of the building.

Willingham said political infighting between the county and the city has kept the problem from getting resolved, leaving residents of the Ten Broeck Triangle neighborhood, who are her constituents, to walk by the crumbling building day after day. "It is not fair to the people," she said.