Former gym building is a sinking boat for Erie Canal Museum

Syracuse.com reported about the Erie Canal Museum's challenges with a $499,000 building they purchased previously for an expansion, now cancelled. Now the building is for sale and the museum owes Onondaga County more than half a million dollars related to the aborted project.

The museum put the building — the old Water Street Gym — on the market six months ago and plans to pay back the county with money from the sale, museum Executive Director Diana Goodsight said.

Once the building is sold, the county will set up a plan for the museum to pay back whatever remains of its $552,105 debt to the county, said Ben Dublin, county director of intergovernmental relations.

“We need to recoup that taxpayer money,” he said.

Dublin was quick to point out that the situation dates back to 2006, before County Executive Joanie Mahoney took office.

It began with a $1.2 million federal grant and the museum’s plan to expand into the building a few doors down in the 300 block of East Water Street.

The county applied for and in 2006 won the federal grant, which came through the state Department of Transportation. The money was to be used by the museum for the expansion.

When the museum killed the expansion — after it bought the building — the grant reverted to the state, but the county was on the hook to pay back the state for the grant money already spent, a total of $431,000, Dublin said.

After the county won the grant, but before the money came in, the county advanced the museum $552,105 for the project, he said. Then County Executive Nick Pirro and the county Legislature agreed in 2006 to advance the museum up to $1.7 million for the project, according to Dublin. The projected cost of the expansion was $1.7 million.

The $1.2 million grant was supposed to buy the building, replace its 1950s facade and ready the interior for use as exhibition galleries, classrooms and hands-on learning space. The museum was responsible for coming up with the other $500,000, Goodsight said.

To actually install the exhibits and finish the project would have cost at least $800,000 on top of the $1.7 million, Goodsight said.

When the economy soured, and given other projects the museum was conducting, its board decided to cancel the expansion to avoid a possible “financial mess,” she said. Read more here.