PLATTSBURGH — Despite voting it down late last year, City of Plattsburgh councilors now appear open to revisiting the use of a state grant for a Sailor’s Beach Park feasibility study.
Much of Sailor’s Beach Park, located across the vehicular bridge at 9 Marina Dr. on the Old Base portion of the former Plattsburgh Air Force Base, has been in a state of disrepair for some time.
“If you folks have been down there, you probably noticed that there’s some hazards present on the site. There’s a, kind of, retaining wall that has concerning things that come out of it. The pier is broken down and a little bit risky, but folks still go down there and use it,” City Community Engagement Coordinator Courtney Meisenheimer told councilors at a meeting Feb. 20.
“It’s predominantly used for fishing. People will go down and hang out by the water in that area. So this plan was to look at that space and create a little bit of a master plan for it, and do some environmental testing, understand what it would cost to start to fix up some of these different elements of the park … fixing the retaining wall, making it a little bit more accessible.”
In 2023, the city decided to take action and seek out a $41,000 grant that would help fund a feasibility study for a comprehensive rehabilitation of Sailor’s Beach Park.
The feasibility study would further a design and development plan for the park. Specifically, a “here’s everything you need to do to now implement construction,” type of plan, Meisenheimer said.
The city was granted the funds in 2024, with all six councilors authorizing the acceptance of a $41,000 grant from the New York State Office of Parks Recreation and Historic Preservation under the Environmental Protection Fund for the purpose of funding the Sailor’s Beach Rehabilitation Feasibility Study.
The city was tasked with also making a $41,000 match from its general fund to bring the feasibility study cost to $82,000 in total.
Barton & Loguidice out of Saratoga was eventually chosen to complete the feasibility study, however, when the engineering firm was set to be awarded the grant at the council’s last meeting of 2024, under previous Mayor Chris Rosenquest, all six councilors at the time rejected it with no explanation given.
‘THE POSSIBILITIES ARE ENDLESS’
A measure that would have established a capital project for Sailor’s Beach was also rejected by councilors at the time.
However, now, with two different faces on the council and a new mayor, there seems to be a willingness to invest in Sailor’s Beach after all.
“I think some of the consensus was that the City Beach still needs work, and so to take on that beach when the City Beach still needs work, seemed silly,” Councilor Julie Baughn (D-Ward 1) said about the council’s previous lack of support for Sailor’s Beach.
“But that’s a beautiful beach down there. The possibilities are endless … I think that it would benefit everybody in that end of town that can’t make it to the City Beach.”
Councilor Amy Collin (D-Ward 6), who was not yet on the council when they voted on the grant last year, asked if the awarding of the grant was still on the table for the city.
Meisenheimer assured Collin it was. She said the city has five years to implement it and the project would take nine to 10 months to complete.
“We’re still well within the time frame to complete the grant. We’re just sort of at a standstill,” Meisenheimer said.
“I don’t want to bring something back (to the council) and then … have it happen (rejected) again, so the feedback is helpful.”
COST CONCERNS
If they were to go forward with the awarding of the grant, Baughn and Dave Monette (D-Ward 5) shared a similar concern about the cost of the study and the city’s share it would have to pay out. Baughn asked if trimming the amount down was possible.
“What will be involved in that is that we’ll have to develop a new scope of work, reissue another RFP (request for proposal), because we’ll be asking for a different (amount) and then have to re-award that bid. I believe if we wanted to keep things as is, we can just move forward with these two bids,” Meisenheimer said.
Mayor Wendell Hughes told her to figure out if it was possible to do that.
Earlier, Hughes expressed the importance of utilizing these state-issued grants when the city is awarded them. He said the city not yet implementing the grant for the feasibility study has not sat well with the state and there have been consequences, so far.
“The state did hold this against us for the approval of another grant at (Melissa) Penfield Park,” Hughes said.
“They said we have two grants that we have not utilized already, and that was part of the decision process when we didn’t get approved for that third grant.”
The other grant the city has not yet utilized is for the repair of City Hall’s steps, which is still out to bid, he said.
“So that really wasn’t fair. I mean, it’s winter time in the North Country — you’re not going to redo steps in the winter time,” Hughes said.
“We can work with that one, but the other one … it’s hard to deal with when we lost some money for Penfield Park.”
Moving forward, Hughes said the city needs to decide for certain if they are indeed going to use a grant before applying for one.
“So we really need to look at the applications. If we’re not going to approve to go forward with them, we need to not go forward with them. I think it’s important that we do that, because … we truly don’t want to miss out on another grant somewhere else.”