In the News

The town’s $36.7 million public safety complex and DPW project gained a $1 million boost from Congress on Wednesday.

U.S. Rep. Richard Neal, D-Springfield, announced the federal earmark for Lee during a ceremony at Town Hall on Wednesday.

The federal money — which was part of the fiscal year 2024 spending bill signed into law on March 9 by President Joe Biden — will go toward one of Lee’s biggest municipal projects in the past 20 to 25 years, Town Administrator Christopher Brittain said.

Neal credited state Rep. William “Smitty” Pignatelli, D-Lenox, for making a strong case to help fund the project.

He called the town of Lee’s request for the money “entirely honorable and entirely needed,” citing challenges facing first responders every day.

The Lee Central Fire Station on Main Street was built in 1912, “literally designed for horse-drawn equipment,” said Brittain. “Our EMS building is held together right now by emergency supports, and we have a police station that’s over 100 years old, with half the space for our current police officers.”

He noted that the new complex not only creates a facility for the town’s first responders, but also relocates the public works department to a newer and better location.

The 37,661-square-foot public safety complex adjacent to the post office on Railroad Street will include community space and is certain to “revitalize a blighted section of downtown Lee,” Brittain said.

Select Board Chairman Gordon Bailey said the federal funding saves the town $600,000 of interest since Lee can now subtract $1 million from the project’s total financing over 25 years.

At last May’s annual town election, Lee residents green-lit the project to exclude the debt from Proposition 2 1/2 by 267-148, well over the simple majority needed.

That means the 25-year financing costs will not count toward the 2.5 percent maximum property tax increase the town can raise from year to year without an override, according to the 1980 state law.

The town has already acquired the properties needed for the project, Brittain told The Eagle on Wednesday.

Those include the 41 Railroad St. site adjacent to the post office for the police, fire and EMS headquarters as well as the 1185 Pleasant St. property that housed Casella Waste Systems and previously Daley Trucking. The Pleasant Street location will be the new headquarters for the Department of Public Works.

Demolition of the sites is likely to start this winter, Brittain said, with construction beginning next fall toward the anticipated completion in March 2027.

“At this point, there has been no change in cost,” he said.

At last December’s special town meeting at which voters eventually approved the project, Brittain said the current central fire station at 179 Main St. would be kept for its historical value and for potential use as a museum.

Brittain said the Airoldi building on Railroad Street was in disrepair, and a 1950s Quonset hut used by the DPW was contaminated with asbestos. The police were operating in a very limited space with failing jail cells in the Town Hall basement, he said.

Brittain said that part of the project’s long-term bond financing will come from $1 million in annual interest the town is collecting from its $26.4 million share of the settlement for the EPA-GE Rest of River PCB cleanup of the Housatonic.

For the average residence, the property tax increase would be limited to $340 a year under a worst-case scenario, he said.

"It's an opportunity to fix several decades of issues in one article tonight," he said in December. "It's a great opportunity worth taking."