Glens Falls Chronicle Serving the Glens Falls/Lake George region; Warren, Washington and northern Saratoga counties since 1980
By Ben Westcott, Chronicle Staff Writer
On March 29, the Warren County Finance and Budget Committee, by a 6-2 vote, threw its support behind the proposed Joseph Warren Center for Leadership and History that has a million dollar price tag.
First proposed by the Warren County Historical Society in 2021, the museum dedicated to Warren, a key figure in the American Revolution for whom the county is named, would be created at the site of a vacant house owned by the county next to the Historical Society’s headquarters on Gurney Lane in Queensbury.
The idea is to transform the building to resemble Warren’s birth home. The plan next comes before the county’s Board of Supervisors for approval.
The Finance and Budget Committee voted to appropriate $800,000 from the county’s General Fund and $200,000 from its Occupancy Tax Reserve to fund the museum, with the stipulation that Occupancy Tax Reserve receipts will reimburse the General Fund $600,000 over three years.
Glens Falls Ward 4 Supervisor Daniel Bruno said the project is “well worth it” and that he thinks “word of mouth will go a long way to making this an attraction, and a good one.” He said that the museum “has a great potential to add to the regional economy.”
Queensbury Town Supervisor John Strough admitted that “$1 million is a lot of money” but said “you either don’t approve it or you approve it and go ahead. I’m inclined to approve it and go ahead, because I think it will be a huge asset to this county as we move forward.”
Queensbury At-Large Supervisor Nathan Etu and Lake Luzerne Supervisor Eugene Merlino were dissenters.
Mr. Merlino told The Chronicle he voted no because the committee proposed to take $800,000 out of the Occupancy Tax Reserve. “I’ve been trying hard to get the tax under control and stop everybody from using it as a bank,” he said.
Mr. Etu faulted the project itself. “If we’re trying to attract tourists and eventually attract younger families to the county to help with our workforce and median age problems, I don’t think this for $1 million is the way to do it.
“I lived in Amesbury, Massachusetts once and we had the Bartlett House (officially the Bartlett Museum), which was named after Josiah Bartlett.
“That dude signed the Declaration of Independence and was the first governor of New Hampshire. Nobody went to that museum.
“It’s just such a lot of money,” Mr. Etu said. “We have to invest in projects and events that are going to attract younger people too.”
Mr. Etu grappled with what he perceived as a lack of connection between Warren, who lived in Boston throughout his life, and the building in Queensbury dedicated to him.
“It’s not his childhood home, it’s not his family’s home, it wasn’t his medical practice or something like that,” Mr. Etu told The Chronicle.
“The building kind of appears as though if we spent a million dollars we could kind of make it look like his childhood home, and that’s just not good enough of a litmus test for funding public dollars.
“I feel like in some ways we’re trying to kind of manufacture history by trying to preserve it,” he said. “We’re not trying to do the wrong thing, but it just seems like a bit of a stretch to just look at a house and say this kind of looks like his childhood home, let’s put a million dollars into it and see if we can get there.”
Mr. Etu said, “I just don’t think that a museum like this is really a principal goal of people visiting the area. It’s hard to believe that this will be a significant principal attractant in my mind.”
He cited the $1 million price as an issue for him. “I think we have this kind of innate inability in our culture to say no, we can’t afford it,” he said. “And I think that inability is not okay.”
Mr. Etu suggested putting the money toward the Warren County Fish Hatchery in Warrensburg, “as we’ve discussed and have a master plan laid out to do.”
The Joseph Warren Center would display memorabilia from the Revolutionary War hero’s life, much from the collection of Lake George native Shane Newell, author of a book on Warren’s role in the creation of America’s democracy in the 1700s, said the Historical Society’s preliminary proposal.
A physician, Warren was president of the Massachusetts Provincial Congress and was a leader of the Sons of Liberty. He was killed June 17, 1775, while fighting in the Battle of Bunker Hill.
The next Warren County Board of Supervisors meeting takes place on Friday, April 19, at 10 a.m.
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