County Legislator and voting member of the Tompkins County Industrial Development Agency Mike Sigler says he stands in solidarity with Ithaca Mayor Svante Myrick in regards to asbestos remediation at the Old Library.

"While I trust the Department of Environmental Conservation will do its job professionally, I also recognize that this construction is in the Mayor's city, directly impacting his constituents. If he has reason to lack faith in the DEC to protect these folks, I stand with him so that his faith can be restored," said Sigler. I support the DEC's work and recognize the top quality of their work, but I also understand the agency needs the full faith of the mayor. I still look at the city building a park at Ithaca Falls, when it was unclear that site was free from lead and which the DEC later found was still contaminated."

Travis Hyde Properties is planning to build more than 70 senior apartments on the old library site that has sat in a state of decay for more than a decade. The mayor says he wants THP to hire an outside engineer to see if the asbestos remediation can be done in a different way than the one required by the DEC. Mayor Myrick mentioned shoring up the building in recent remarks to the Ithaca Journal 11/10/18.

Myrick has said without the tax abatement from the IDA, it's unlikely the project will go forward and has said without that outside assessment, he's unlikely to endorse the DEC plan, a process that's been used more than 30 times before in the city, but at least for this site, has some citizens' concerned. Sigler says he understands Mayor Myrick wanting to satisfy those concerns and wants to work with him on the IDA to do that.

Sigler continued, "I hope the city will step up and share in the cost of that review since it's outside what's required by the state agency in charge, the DEC. I understand an engineer may come in and say that the roof, which is the dangerous part here, can be replaced, and a then a team can go in and remove the asbestos. But it's likely the cost will make the project impossible. That will mean these apartments will be lost and fewer seniors will be able to live downtown, but I believe Mayor Myrick has weighed those risks and also weighed what using an abatement in this fashion will mean for future development in Ithaca."

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