NEWFANE — With the defeat of Tuesday's bond vote seeking $950,000 for a new office building, workers in the town offices will have to stay put for the foreseeable future.
By a vote of 286 to 226, townspeople voted against the article.
After many years of making piecemeal repairs to the current town offices, the Selectboard last November formed a full working committee to address the building's deficiencies, among them a lack of privacy, heating issues, insufficient room in the vault, and non-ADA-compliant bathrooms.
Earlier this year, the Board hired architectural firm Cotton Design to assess three options: keep putting money into the leaky, drafty building; renovate and put an addition on the building; or sell it and construct a new building next door.
The Selectboard held two public informational meetings and numerous discussions at their meetings, finally taking the town office committee's recommendation to choose the third option.