Former VNA building to be razed

Come 2018, the former Visiting Nurse Association building may stand no longer, making way for a view of the Black River on Main Street in Springfield after the town selectboard voted Monday to allocate the money for its demolition.

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2017-08-16 / Front Page Town to demolish former VNA building; accepts town plan By KELSEY CHRISTENSEN kchristensen@eagletimes.com SPRINGFIELD, Vt. — Come 2018, the former Visiting Nurse Association (VNA) building may stand no longer, making way for a view of the Black River on Main Street in Springfield after the town selectboard voted Monday to allocate the money for its demolition. Payment for the demolition will consist of $40,000 from one of the town’s revolving loan funds, $35,000 from the town’s unsafe building reserve, and a $50,000 grant from the Moeser Fund, a matching fund. Asbestos removal in that building will begin this week, all according to Town Manager. Tom Yennerell, who said he hopes the building will be demolished “before snow flies.” Selectboard Chair Kristi Morris commented that the cost allocated to the demolition is symptomatic of specific considerations that must be made for that building. “We can’t just knock it over and have it float downstream,” he said. The former VNA building's demolition is among the moves the Town of Springfield is making to exact its Streetscape Master Plan, which was developed through a state grant alongside White River-based urban planner Carolyn Radisch. The plan details an overhaul of the Springfield downtown area and includes a road diet on Clinton Street, opening the view from the downtown to the Black River, and other measures that aim to improve transportation, aesthetics, and economic development in the downtown. Yennerell reported to the board on Monday that he and Radisch had recently presented the Master Plan to executive-level administrators at the Vermont Agency of Commerce and Community Development (VACCD), Agency of Natural Resources, and VTrans. “They were very receptive,” Yennerell said of the presentation. The board also adopted the 2017 Town Plan on Monday, a document which the town must revise every eight years (although the previous town plan was adopted in 2014), and which the town will submit to the Southern Windsor County Regional Planning Commission (SWCRPC) in order to continue being eligible for VACCD downtown designation. “It’s been commented that the town plan just becomes a book on the shelf,” Morris said. “We’re hoping this is more of a document that can be used for our future.” After the planning commission developed the document, the selectboard held two public hearings where citizen’s comments could result in substantial amendments, including the one preceding Monday’s board meeting. On July 6, the first public hearing, the board made non-substantial edits to the document for typos, punctuation, and grammar. Due to the nature of the edits, the board was able to move forward with the adoption process, holding a second public hearing and adopting by unanimous vote after calling the selectboard meeting to order. “The selectboard and the planning commission has really examined this, for people thinking we’ve zipped through this,” said George McNaughton, a resident, former select board member, and Greenways, Trails, Byways, and Rural Economic Development Advisory Committee member. The second public hearing was not without discussion, as resident Jim Chlebak raised concerns over the language in the chapter on energy in the town plan. The plan acknowledges that energy developments like solar arrays may have “no adverse affect on the public viewshed,” which McNaughton clarified referred to the view from public lands such as highways and trails. Chlebak, he says, went to the Planning Commission meeting about the 500 kilowatt array Catamount Solar had proposed to install at Springfield Hospital earlier in the summer, which would affect Chlebak’s residential view. “The town wrote a wonderful letter to the developer saying that it was going up in a neighborhood. That letter went so much further than the town plan,” Chlebak said. Selectboard member Walter Martone explained that the town has little say in what sites the Public Utilities Commission (PUC) deems worthy for a project, but that the energy chapter of the town plan is being revised. “If we meet the law, we have much more of a say,” Martone says. Previously, energy siting has been largely out of local control, as the PUC and Public Service Board (PSB) oversee the awarding of necessary permitting for energy development. Recently, however, the PSB has already begun to restrict the types of sites preferable for arrays, and new rules may allow local officials more control if they conduct their own study of preferred sites and report them to the state. At that point, Martone says, “They can’t just unilaterally discount it [our preferred siting], they would have to be very specific about the reasons they disagree.” Meanwhile, Char Osterland of the energy committee pointed out that “the purpose of the energy committee is to find renewable energy, and we try to do the best for everybody but sometimes that’s not possible.” Chlebak also asked about the possibility of demolishing buildings that are “not being used to their full potential,” to which Morris explained the town has plans to demolish 5 and 7 Main St., which the town has purchased in order to expand the riverwalk. Following the adoption of the town plan, the selectboard also voted to allocate $12,000 from a revolving loan fund — a different revolving loan fund than the one from which VNA demolition funds were allocated — which will be granted to the Springfield Regional Development Corporation (SRDC) in order to produce three videos to market Springfield. “It’s important to get Springfield into the marketplace and let the world know all the great things Springfield has,” said Bob Flint, director of the SRDC. The SRDC, as well as Springfield on the Move (SOM) and the Springfield Regional Chamber of Commerce are partnering with Indelible Productions, a local production company, to create three short videos that will market working in Springfield, living in Springfield, and the downtown, all of which will touch on the benefits of the town’s connection to one of the fastest internet speeds in the country. Flint says that some of the funding will go to other marketing efforts, which the town can use to determine which markets are the most responsive. The videos are projected to be completed by the beginning of November. Additionally, the selectboard allocated $111,703 for transfer station improvements. The $111,703 will come to the town from the Southern Windham/Windsor Counties Solid Waste District’s capital reserve fund, a portion of which was paid to all towns which participated in the waste district. Yennerell would like to return to flat-rates per bag rather than the current model of weighing household waste, which Yennerell says will streamline the process. The board also awarded a bid for County Road culvert repairs to Neil H. Daniels, of Daniels Construction. The town has allocated $310,000 for the project with the Daniels’ bid at $269,750. Finally, the board signed a loan agreement to fund sewer and stormwater improvements including sewer relining at J&L, pump station upgrades at the Plaza, Midway and 100 River Street, and collection system work at Clinton, Olive, Mineral, Slack, Woolson, Upper Valley, Bailey, and Holt streets. The loan, which will come from the Vermont Municipal Bond Bank, is worth $1,572,823, to be paid back over 20 years will 0 percent interest and $500,000 forgiven.