Mayor Bob Blais of Lake George Village, 51 years in office, is the longest serving mayor in New York State history, and he may be the last mayor of Lake George Village ever.
A successful community petition to dissolve Lake George Village into the surrounding Town of Lake George was placed on his desk earlier this month, he said, adding that the petition was unexpected.
The petition does not force the village to dissolve into the town. However, it requires that the village announce a community-wide vote on the matter. That vote is set for Sept. 13. Blais said he will announce the vote at the village’s June 20 meeting.
In the meantime, the village has hired a consultant, the LaBerge Group, to help the community assess the financial consideration of dissolution, and the report will help people make their decision, he and others said.
Town of Lake George code enforcer Doug Frost led the petition effort and collected the most signatures. He is a lifelong resident of the village itself.
Blais said that similar dissolutions have been proposed or completed in communities across the state, but he believes the move is unnecessary in Lake George Village.
Frost got involved after the Village considered but did not complete its own study earlier this year.
Blais said his office was looking to fill five vacant seats at the time, and was seeking financing for a $24 million dollar wastewater treatment plant.
A similar study conducted in 2009 estimated that taxpayers might face an 8% to 9% increase were dissolution to occur.
“The purpose of dissolution studies is to save taxpayers and communities money. It’s supposed to increase services to the community at no cost to the taxpayers. Dissolutions which have happened across the state have historically been small villages that are having some financial stress,” Blais said. “It’s exactly the opposite in this particular case.”
The village and town of Lake George benefit from a unique agreement which sees them share many services, including police, fire departments, courts, planning, zoning, and more.
Though the Town of Lake George is larger than the Village, with a population of around 3,500 to 1,000 respectively, Blais said the village is hardly a struggling community.
“The Village is larger than the Town, as far as assets, income, finances, and services. In this particular case, which is highly unusual, the village owns all of the major services. The only service we don’t share is highway departments,” the mayor said.
Advocates for the dissolution study believe that the situation might be more complicated.
The petition forces the process forward.
“People have an interest in being able to see the information, to make an informed decision on whether they want to vote on keeping the village or becoming part of the town,” Frost said.
Frost said he believes that dissolution could present other opportunities to the community.
“There’s an enormous amount of growth happening in the Town of Lake George right now, growth which will ultimately bring an immense amount of assessed valuation to the town. But we, in the village, won’t see that benefit,” Frost said.