BANGOR, Maine — The Bangor City Hall celebrated 50 years on October 2019. Now the city is trying to get nearly $6 million in renovation money from Tuesday's vote.
City Hall was built after the great fire of 1911 by architect Oscar Wenderoth. He built several federal buildings across the United States, including the one in Bangor.
The City of Bangor purchased the building from the U.S Federal Government in the 1960's.
"They wanted to construct something quickly, so the architect used similar plans for what's almost a duplicate building in Danville, Illinois;" said Anne Krieg, the City Planner for the City of Bangor.
The 45,000 sq.ft. building was home to the post office and had offices for the federal court system before becoming Bangor City Hall in 1969.
"The federal government felt very strongly that buildings should have a sense of prominence to show the importance of all of these cities and towns that the federal building was putting their buildings in," said Krieg.
On November 5th, Bangor voters are being asked to consider a 6 million dollar bond for renovations to the interior.
"Obviously six million dollars is a lot of money, we are well aware of that... this building is actually 45 thousand square feet, about half of that money would be to reconfigure the first floor," said Debbie Cyr, the finance director for the City of Bangor.
Also part of the plan for the funds is going towards upgrading building systems.
Nowadays if you want a birth or marriage certificate, a vehicle registration, or a yard sale permit.
"You actually have to go to three separate offices, wait in three separate lines and complete three separate transactions," said Cyr.
To overcome that, the city is planning to create a "one-stop shop" to do all of those things plus dog, hunting and fishing licenses in a single office.
The restoration would also fix bathrooms, work desks, elevators and the facility in general, which does not comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act.
Today, the Bangor City Hall is home to more than 80 employees with more than 17 departments and services.
To make this renovation happen, the city would need the majority of the voters to vote "yes" on the referendum question on their ballot on November 5th.