January 30, 2013 THE VILLADOM TIMES III • Page 11 Saddle River The proposal for an extensive renovation to the Saddle River Borough Hall is now in the hands of three members of the municipality’s council. Council members Karen Mastriano, Bruce Walynczyk, and Michael Toomey have been asked to review all of the information that has been provided to date, including the ad hoc committee’s recommendation, the architectural plans, the issues raised by the public, and the opinions of the borough’s professionals. At that point, the three council members will make a recommendation. The building plan has drawn negative reactions from several residents, some of whom have organized as the Committee of Concerned Saddle River Taxpayers, a nonpartisan group that is working to halt the building plan. Saddle River Borough Administrator Charles Cuccia acknowledged that borough officials have heard residents’ comments, chiefly regarding the size and expense of the proposed building. “The Committee of Concerned Saddle River Taxpayers believes that this new committee of council members should take its time and study a number of criti- Building proposal in council members’ hands cal issues before making any new building recommendations. In particular, we believe the borough (should) figure out whether it really needs to host a municipal court in Saddle River over the long term. We also believe that a small renovation should be studied as an alternative to a large new borough hall as we do not believe that the size of Saddle River’s government is going to grow that much in the future; nor do we think it should grow that much in the future,” the group said in a statement released by Paul Schulstad. An ad hoc committee conducted the original study of the municipal building and issued a recommendation in November. At that time, Saddle River officials noted that the project would bring borough hall, including the municipal court, into compliance with current safety and access standards. Bruce Meisel, who chaired the ad hoc committee that spent several years evaluating this project, explained, “The existing building is approximately 9,000 square feet. The proposal calls for demolishing the existing…building and replacing it with a building that is approximately 14,350 square feet for a increase of about 5,350 square feet over the current building. The architects estimate that the entire new building would cost about $3,500,000 which would be bonded over 20 years. The annual debt service is estimated at $220,000.” The existing T-shaped borough hall was constructed in 1937, and underwent an internal update in the 1980s, when the downstairs portion of the structure that had served as the fire station and police department was converted into municipal offices. The building, which is not compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act, has three floors. The second floor has traditionally been used as the council chambers, and the third floor is used for storage. The brownstone portion of the building now houses the court, a conference room, the construction office, a computer room, and the archives. Plans call for the brownstone portion of the building to remain. At present, there is no access to the third floor via elevator. Although barrierfree access is available to both the first and the second floors, there is no barrier-free option to move between the first and second floors without going outside the building and re-entering from another doorway. In a December letter to borough residents, Mayor Samuel Raia wrote that the ad hoc committee recommended that the existing 9,000 square foot building be replaced with a new 19,000 square foot building at a proposed cost of approximately $300 per square foot. After hearing concerns about the size of the proposed building, Raia asked the committee to speak with the project architect, and the proposal was reduced in both size and cost.