Architect sought for City Hall roof work

KINGSTON, N.Y. » The city will begin advertising this weekend for an architectural firm to design needed repairs to the City Hall roof.

City Engineer Ralph Swenson said that his office will place advertisements in various publications in hopes of attracting a firm for the project.

The city expects the design work for the roof repair and work inside the City Hall tower will cost about $45,000. The total cost of the roof and tower work is expected to be about $768,000.

The Kingston Common Council

has approved borrowing the money needed for the work.

In March, the city hired C.T. Male Associates of Latham to conduct a preliminary scope of work for submission to the city’s insurance carrier. That report has been completed, Swenson said.

Swenson has said the roof of City Hall, at 420 Broadway in Midtown, is nearly 30 years old and was damaged during the March 2 Nor’easter.

C.T. Male evaluated the City Hall roof and tower in 2011 and recommended three phases of repair work, Swenson wrote in a letter to Common Council President James Noble. He said the first phase of the work, done in 2012, included some repointing of the tower’s bricks and sealing of joints, as well as reroofing the tower.

But “the tower gets a lot of moisture penetration from driving rain,” Swenson told the Common Council’s finance committee. And once the tower gets soaked, he said, the moisture is pulled inside the structure.

Swenson said the city must finish repointing and sealing the tower to prevent further damage.

City Hall was built between 1872 and 1875, and the tower was rebuilt after a 1927 fire. The city vacated the building in 1972 and relocated its municapal offices to 1 Garraghan Drive in the Rondout district. The Broadway building later underwent a $7 million renovation that culminated with it reopening as City Hall in May 2000.