Judge throws out rec center lawsuit

"We got one major obstacle out of the way and we are working hard to resolve the last obstacle," said Mayor Scott Johnson. "Who knew it would be so difficult to build a children's recreation center in Saratoga Springs?"

The lawsuit from the Friends of South Side Recreation states that the city did not take the proper steps to get approved, failed to meet zoning laws and was not properly funded to meet the criteria of the City Charter.

"We were vindicated by following the correct steps in the planning process contrary to what that group believed," Johnson added.

Due to the lawsuit, the project was put on hold. The problem is a $1.7 million bond will expire on April 1, leaving the City Council very little time to resolve their issues before the bond money must be used or given back.

The second obstacle involves the New York State Department of Labor and a stop bid order which is currently holding back the project. While the city is negotiating with the Department of Labor, the stop bid order has yet to be lifted which will delay getting shovels in the ground until an agreement is made.

"We are taking it day to day. I am well aware of the bond deadlines and everything that needs to be done regarding the recreation center," Johnson said. "We just want to resolve this issue and finally move forward with it."

Commissioner of Finance Kenneth Ivins is hoping to work through the problems and get the project rolling. If the city loses the bond from Adirondack Trust, which is the worse case scenario, the city would have to pay back the bond over time along with accruing interest. The city has the option to give back the principal, but city taxpayers have already been paying interest on the bond for more than two years.

The city could pay off the bond early, avoiding paying the interest that the city would accrue over the time it would have taken them to pay off the bond originally.

"We've already spent $400,000 in designs, traffic studies and soil testing, and another $400,000 in interest. There's too much money being spent to have it all lost," he said. "We have little time left to work with, and we are still hoping to get things settled by April 1 in order to avoid all of these scenarios. This project was left in our laps by the last administration with no design or location, just a time frame that the public has been
paying for."