Demolition of the old Ketchum City Hall building is scheduled to start Monday, May 16, the city announced Monday, May 9.
The city has a contract with Bellevue-based Elite Restoration to demolish the building at 480 East Ave., one block north of Town Square. The company has already conducted asbestos removal and prepared the building for demolition.
The city moved its administrative, fire and police operations to new locations last year. Administrative and police operations moved to the new City Hall on Fifth Street. The Fire Department moved to a new headquarters on Saddle Road.
The demolition was originally scheduled for April but has been delayed slightly.
The city has accepted approximately $201,000 from the Ketchum Urban Renewal Agency to cover the costs of demolishing the building.
The city is providing the .6-acre site on East Avenue to accommodate the 51-unit Bluebird Village workforce-housing development. The land will be leased for a nominal fee for up to 75 years.
The developer for the public-private partnership that is building Bluebird Village has said he plans to start construction of the project soon after the demolition. 
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Perry, you are spot on with your comments regarding Bluebird and the new definition of workforce housing. In the Housing Plan one only needs to be looking for work to gain tax payer funded housing and one is only required to work 20 hours a week to qualify and there is no specification that a person works in Ketchum, they could work remotely for a company located anywhere in the world. Also, let's be reminded that once a person has successfully gained a unit in a tax credit project like Bluebird or Northwood Place they are in for good no matter how their income status changes. I do not support the LOT increase and will vote against it.
Hindsight seems to show it would have been better to rebuild City Hall in this space and use other city owned property for this boondoggle.
@CasualO - The expensive big-city consultants probably didn't like a simpler solution like that, better to shuffle everything around and involve as many properties, designers, planners, engineers, financers, and general contractors as possible. Efficient & expedient use of taxpayer property & funds are often not the highest concern. After all, they can always just raise the LOT tax and collect more of our money.
Part of the problem is that the City never does a cost/benefit analysis of a variety of options. Sometime they will do a pros/cons, but that's as far as they go. They choose a course of action then justify why is is the only option, thus presenting us with fait accompli. Voila--Bluebird.
You didn’t need hindsight for that. Many people make that observation prior to the Mayor’s “shuffle” of Old City Hall, the Washington Lot, New City Hall, the new Fire House and Bluebird. Not enough people got involved to stop it.
I think Mr Foley jumped the gun. The City plans to give the site to Bluebird, but it can’t yet because Bluebird does not have its financing package in place. The City cannot issue a building permit without that. Despite the city’s recent commitment of millions of $$ $ more to Bluebird, it is possible that the for-profit out-of-state developer comes back for even more. Where will that come from? The increase in LOT tax, which is not just a tourist tax, but a multi-million $$$ tax on locals. Bluebird is the first priority in the new housing plan. But since the ballot says that money can only go to “workforce” housing and Bluebird cannot require tenants to work, today the City Council changed the definition of the word “workforce” to include people who choose not to work. Incredible as that seems, it is true. Please read the housing plan on the City website. The Council will not let something as trivial as the English language stand in the way of their commitment to spend whatever it takes to build Bluebird, no matter how much, or how much better or faster that money could be spent to create workforce housing in the commonly accepted definition of the word. Alice seems stuck in Wonderland.
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