Goetz Wants to Put Plans for New Village Hall on the Fast Track

Village President Greg Goetz said he wants village officials to consider speeding up in order to include the project in Sussex's next round of borrowing.

Goetz said he doesn’t want to put any more money into the current facility and he wants to complete the work at the same time other are taking place.

“I would hate to do the whole streetscape and redesign projects in 2015, and then redo the village hall in 2018 and all of that would have to be torn up again,” he said. “The bottom line is (the current building) is an old schoolhouse, and the best way I can put it is that it’s not meant to be a village hall.”

The project is currently being discussed at the committee level, where members are backing a plan to build a new 20,000-square-foot Village Hall on the site of the current facility along with a planned 24,000-square-foot addition to the . The committee is expected to make a final decision for a facility plan by the end of the year.

Village Trustee Pat Tetzlaff, who chairs the Village Hall Study Committee, said Goetz’s comments will not affect how the group will conduct its work, but it may quell some concerns of those who thought their work would be put away and forgotten by village officials.

“We’re going to continue and it won’t change the track we’re on right now,” she said. “Right now Greg and everyone else will keep us moving on the study.”

Goetz said he only wants to discuss speeding up the project as long as the financial conditions are favorable to the village and he would like to avoid the estimated $500,000 needed in repairs and expansion to the current building.

“If it’s not within our fiscal bounds, we wouldn’t do it then,” he said.

The Village Board will discuss speeding the project forward during a July meeting, Goetz said, where trustees will determine the priorities of the village in the coming year.

If the board deems the replacement to be a high priority, members would discuss adding the plan to the village’s borrowing plan for the next five years.

Because replacement of the Village Hall would cost between $5 million and $6 million, Goetz said the proposal would go to voters in a referendum.

He also said if trustees are receptive to speeding up the plan, he would be also open to discussing the potential of setting money aside the next several years to reduce the total amount borrowed by the village to construct a new facility.