But there could be one major impediment to the plan: the federal government.

At least one Columbia County municipal leader, Hudson Mayor Richard Scalera, has heard from state officials that stimulus money cannot be used to construct municipal buildings, though Stockport officials said they have not received that message.

The Stockport Town Hall is currently located on Atlantic Avenue in the hamlet of Stottville. A former firehouse, the facility has been used for more than three decades to house the town office, town court, and police department. Pulcher told ccSCOOP on Wednesday that the existing facility is cramped and in need of repair.

Using its reserve funds, the Town Board purchased land in Columbiaville for $125,000 two years ago, with the intention of building a new town hall. The plan met with resistance from Councilman Jack Mabb and some other residents. The project stalled when an estimate for constructing the building came in "well higher than expected," Pulcher said.

The Town then explored a second option: purchasing a pre-constructed building from Corcraft, a manufacturing unit operated by the New York State Department of Correctional Services. That came with a price tag of $1 million for purchase and construction and another $300,000 for preparing the site, Pulcher said.

"It is a nice design," said Pulcher, who said the facility was modeled after the Stuyvesant Town Hall, which was constructed in the early part of this decade.

Perhaps, said Mabb, but not worth the cost. "One million dollars for a new town hall for a town with 3,000 residents is ridiculous," he said.

Pulcher said he saw no other option after the economic downturn last year but to table the project. "It wouldn’t have made sense to continue," he commented. "Who knows what was going to happen with sales tax revenues and other revenues?”

The federal stimulus plan opened a new window for the town. "That gave us a new option" said Pulcher.

Mabb, who explained that he is opposed on principle to the federal stimulus package, said he might consider supporting using stimulus funds for the new town hall, if they were awarded. "I don’t like the stimulus," he said, “but it’s free money, and if we don’t take it, someone else will get it. . . . I’d have to think about” [whether I would support using it for the Town Hall].

The Town Hall proposal is one of several projects for which the Town of Stockport is seeking  federal stimulus funds. The others are infrastructure work, including replacing a “very brittle” forced water main on Atlantic Avenue, correction of a drainage problem in Chester Avenue, and addressing a water issue in the Kings Acres development in Columbiaville.