www.pall-times.com/articles/2006/06/01/news.news1.txt
LIGHTHOUSE'S FUTURE SUDDENLY AN UNCERTAINTY
By ADELE DELSAVIO, Staff Writer
H. Lee White Marine Museum associate director Mercedes Niess dropped a bombshell on the audience, and the residents of the Port City, at the museum's “Write On!” and “Art & History Rule!” awards ceremony Wednesday evening.
“I received a call today from the New York State Historic Preservation Office. Our lighthouse is on the list for demolition,” she said.
The audience gasped.
“If we're going to save our lighthouse we're going to need a grassroots effort,” she said. “We need to put our thinking caps on.”
After the ceremony, Niess said that she'd based her announcement on a 4:30 p.m. phone call from a representative of the N.Y. State Historic Preservation Office who she knows to be reliable. Her assistant, she said, took the message.
“He (the representative) was definite about the word ‘demolition,'” she said.
The representative left the Web address of the U.S. General Services Administration with Niess' assistant. Niess said she had not been able to check the site before making the announcement at the ceremony.
A search of the site indicates that the Oswego lighthouse is offered, apparently for sale, “as is” and “where is,” as of today.
“The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will issue a Park and Recreation lease to the successful applicant for use of the abutting breakwater to allow access from land. The New York State Office of General Services will issue a license to the successful applicant for the submerged lands underneath the lighthouse,” a notice on the Web site says.
Niess said she will look into the discrepancy - demolition or sale? - today.
“I'm very concerned anyway. We thought that it's being on the National Register of Historic Places would protect it. It doesn't look like that's the case,” she said.
According to Lighthouse Digest Magazine, the current lighthouse was built in 1934. It is the fourth lighthouse for the city, which has had a lighthouse for almost 200 years.
Oswego's acting mayor Randy Bateman said, when contacted by The Palladium-Times Wednesday evening, that he had not heard anything about a prospective demolition.
His first reaction to the idea was: “We have to do everything we can to save the lighthouse! It's our landmark - our beacon to people coming into the Oswego harbor.”
Niess said the only way to save the lighthouse from demolition would be for the city of Oswego to take it over.
“This certainly is a shocker,” she said.
By the end of the ceremony she had collected 30 signatures. “I have a full sheet of names of people who are up in arms,” she said.