November 4th, Trojans voted out every Republican on the City Council. November 7th, Tom Casey called it nothing more than a national wave. Dismissing the will of the people of Troy to be represented by a responsible government. Instead, they saddled Trojans with a 30-year fiscal decision on what the Corporation Counsel acknowledged was a draft.
Four to three, straight down party lines.
The Terms
Total project cost: approximately $11.1 million, covering $1.8 million for building acquisition, $8.1 million for construction, and the remainder in capitalized interest, legal, and finance costs. The Troy Local Development Corporation approved up to $12.5 million in tax-exempt bonds. Fixed rent: $675,000 per year, capped at $685,000 over 30 years.
The Administration projects savings built on a lease escalator Carmella negotiated herself.
Council Member Vera pointed out on the floor that the Mantello Administration had added the escalator when it renegotiated the prior lease. Carmella signed an amended five-year lease retroactive to January 2024, at $35,220.50 per month, with a 3 percent escalator she negotiated herself. The savings projection was built against terms this Administration had created.
Vera also flagged the triple-net structure. Because the city is responsible for all repairs and maintenance, projected savings may not materialize once repair costs accumulate on a 1914 building.
Donnelly’s response to cost concerns: “If you don’t like the price of this project, you should really see what new construction is going to cost.”
The Process
In August 2025, Carmella announced a council vote on the lease with less than 48 hours notice. Steele called it a “chaotic, secretive process” with no referral to planning or finance committees. She had written to the Administration in June and every month after requesting basic project documents. She never received a reply.
At the November 6 Finance Meeting, her position was the same: the outgoing council had no right to bind an incoming council and the public to a 30-year lease without releasing the underlying documents. The lease was still a draft when the council voted. Corporation Counsel Morrissey acknowledged this on the floor.
Tom Casey closed the debate with his reading of the election results: “The November 4 election results were a national anti-Republican wave.” Not, he argued, a referendum on the city hall proposal. Then he voted to approve a 30-year lease.
The Construction Plan
The disputed centerpiece is a new assembly hall built inside the theater auditorium, a “box-in-a-box” on lightweight steel framing, set on two-inch concrete over structural foam, erected inside the historic space.
John White, an architectural preservationist who testified at the November 6 Finance Meeting, said the plan would destroy the lower 15 feet of the auditorium, damage the stage, the orchestra floor, and four of the five arches, and violate Secretary of Interior standards for historic preservation. He called the $8 million construction estimate implausible given a 2010 assessment that put full restoration at $10 million. Architect Daniel Moresy said the work would irreversibly destroy character-defining features.
The Administration’s answer: the stage was already compromised, no arches would be removed, and the curtain would be stored.
The SHPO Letter
Donnelly told the council that the State Historic Preservation Office supports the project as an adaptive reuse model and that a SHPO letter had been shared demonstrating that support. Steele disputed this on the floor.
The letter does not commend the project. It does not describe it as a model. SHPO said reversible work would have no impact on the historic property. The Administration called that an endorsement.
Because the LDC is not seeking historic tax credits, SHPO has no enforcement role regardless of what the letter says.
The First Columbia Problem
The city hall move created a second legal dispute before the council even voted. Carmella had activated the termination clause on the Hedley Park Place lease on May 30, 2025, before the council had formally approved a new site. First Columbia, the building’s owner, argued the lease required council approval first.
First Columbia’s claims: $184,025 in unpaid 2024 common area maintenance charges, plus $1,445,432 in anticipatory breach damages for the early termination. Total exposure: more than $1.6 million. Steele said the CAM charges were “legitimate” and criticized Carmella for “ignoring” them while pushing the Proctor’s deal. Her warning from earlier that summer: the city risked paying two leases simultaneously.
At the November 6 Finance Meeting, Corporation Counsel Morrissey announced a tentative $134,000 settlement with First Columbia on the CAM charges.
Partisan angle: Trojans are now committed to Proctor’s Theater until 2055. Why did an outgoing council vote on the decision? They were voted out; they chose to ignore us and vote on a draft contract, stealing that decision from the newly elected council. Our Mayor thinks this is what responsible governance looks like.
Sources: Spectrum News; CBS6; Spectrum News, August 2025; WAMC, June 13, 2025; WAMC, July 31, 2025; Troy City Council Finance and Regular Meeting, November 6, 2025 (transcript)