Village board updated on post-college planning process

By kAtE Hill Staff WritEr

During the March 6 Village of Cazenovia Board of Trustees meeting, Mayor Kurt Wheeler and Lauren Lines, executive director of the Cazenovia Area Community Development Association, Inc. (CACDA), provided an update on the community’s ongoing planning for the future of the Cazenovia College campus.

On Dec. 7, 2022, Cazenovia College announced its decision to permanently close following the spring 2023 semester due to financial difficulties.

Within days of the announcement, a team of local leaders/stakeholders began meeting to analyze the challenge facing the community and to discuss potential paths forward for the campus.

According to Wheeler, the group aims to identify and pursue a holistic future use for the majority of the campus that will recreate the substantial economic and cultural impact of the college on the community.

Wheeler began his update by reporting that the college, at the behest of the bondholders, has engaged a broker, A&G Real Estate Partners.

The mayor said he and Lines recently met with two representatives of the national real estate firm while they were in town familiarizing themselves with the college property.

“It was a very positive engagement,” Wheeler said. “We offered our help to them. . . At this point, it’s a team effort to get the best possible buyer for any part of the college property or, we hope, a big chunk of it all at once. They were very receptive to that. It was not an adversarial meeting at all. It was very positive, very collegial, and cooperative, I thought.”

On Feb. 6, the village board authorized the hiring of commercial realtor Joshua Podkaminer, of JWP Commercial, to serve as a consultant to the village and the broader community during the post-college planning process and the transition of the college’s real estate assets to new uses.

According to Wheeler, Podkaminer has been an “outstanding” advisor so far.

Lines stated that Podkaminer was a valuable addition to a recent working group session.

“We had a variety of expertise around the table, but not necessarily in real estate,” she said. “He mostly sat back and listened but knew when to inject a creative idea or think about things a little differently from a real estate perspective. He was really, really helpful.”

Lines then announced that CACDA has launched a new website, futureofcazenovia.org, to create a place for sharing news, information, and ideas about the Village l Page 12