$8.2M restoration of St. Paul's proposed

The Committee to Save St. Paul's has presented an $8.2-million restoration plan for the historic school to the Garden City village board.

The committee, along with the Garden City Historical Society, explained the plan to rehabilitate the 132-year-old building, topped by gargoyles and spires, and turn it into a center for community events such as meetings, senior citizen activities, plays and art exhibits.

"It's not something that we can do immediately, but we think this is the place to start," J. Edmund Keating, vice president of the independent committee, said during the board's work session. More than 150 people attended the meeting Thursday night.

Garden City has tried to preserve the architectural landmark at the corner of Stewart and Rockaway avenues since it bought the 7-acre site from the Episcopal Diocese of Long Island in 1993 for $7.25 million. The village has spent at least $100,000 a year to maintain the four-story red brick building, which was built in 1879 and has about 500 rooms. St. Paul's, a former boarding school for boys, was once one of the top prep schools in the country.

In April, voters rejected a plan to demolish it.

"We can't afford to let the building crumble," said Peter Negri, president of the committee, which spent four months working on the new plan.

The project would be funded through grants, donations and tax dollars, and the groups already have raised more than $1 million in pledges, Negri said. The annual operating cost of the center would be $162,868 and cost taxpayers an average of $100 a year, Negri said.

The plan calls for refurbishing 10,500 square feet of first-floor parlors and hallways, as well as a second-floor chapel, and sealing off the rest of the 130,000-square-foot structure. The work would include a new roof, smoke alarms, sprinklers, heat and air-conditioning systems and repairs on windows and other items.

Keating requested that village officials draft a bond resolution for $10 million and hold a referendum that would allow village voters to decide whether to fund the plan.

Committee members asked the board to write a letter of support to accompany a state grant application for as much as $400,000.

But some trustees were reluctant to do that without knowing the specific requirements of the grant.

Negri explained that waiting for the approval until the next village meeting on Oct. 20 might mean not having time to prepare the grant application by the Oct. 31 deadline.

"For 18 years, we have been working on this project," said trustee Dennis C. Donnelly. "I don't think it is very smart to approve something we were presented in 15 minutes."