By BRIAN NEARING, Staff Writer  First published: Wednesday, July 2, 2003

St. Joseph's suggestions sought
3 hearings are set to get public's advice on what to do with Arbor Hill 
church seized by city 

Have an idea for what to do with a crumbling 138-year-old neo-Gothic Church in Albany's Arbor Hill neighborhood? Matthew Bender IV wants to hear from you.

Bender, a prominent local philanthropist, heads a committee for the Historic 
Albany Foundation, which last month received the former St. Joseph's Church building from the city. The foundation is seeking a new use for the old church on Ten Broeck Street and expects to spend $600,000 just to stabilize the building in time for winter.

"Our goal is to be open and share what we hear and learn," Bender said 
Monday. "We want to hear what the neighborhood has to say ... but we also have to remind people that we have to be fiscally realistic."

The first public hearing on the church will be from 7:15 p.m. to 9 p.m. 
Tuesday at Sweet Pilgrim Baptist Church, Clinton Avenue and Ten Broeck Street. Subsequent hearings are scheduled from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. July 19 at the New Covenant Charter School, 50 Lark St., and from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. July 23 at the city of Albany's Public Safety Building, 165 Henry Johnson Blvd.

The foundation has a $300,000 state grant to help pay for repairs, but that 
amount must be matched by a fund-raising drive. So far, the foundation has 
raised about $23,000, said Executive Director Elizabeth Griffin.

Griffin estimated that once the building's roof and columns are fixed, it 
likely will cost $5.5 million more to repair and restore it for the still 
undetermined use. Bender said final numbers won't be possible to determine until a new use is.

The city gave the foundation the church after seizing it in January as 
structurally unsafe. Its previous owner, Lark Street restaurateur Elda Abate, is in court challenging the city's seizure and subsequent $1 purchase offer.

The city invested nearly $250,000 in emergency repairs. Abate had paid $1 for the church to the Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany, which deconsecrated it in 2000.

She had wanted to put a banquet hall or a nightclub there, but both of those 
plans encountered stiff neighborhood opposition.