Nancy Kern reports for Columbia-Greene Media that at a meeting on Aug. 21, the Athens Town Board agreed to pay a local engineer to begin how to modernize the Athens Community Center. The building was put up in 1901 and currently houses the municipal offices of the town and village of Athens. Previously, there has been an elementary school and Columbia-Greene Community College classes in the building. The spending passed 3-1, with Councilperson Anthony Paluch as the dissenting vote. The town and the village will split the $50,000 bill. Athens Town Supervisor Michael Pirrone said, “We want to start updating things, get more modern in handling the books and records and archives and so forth.... The Mayor and Deputy Mayor suggested we join together in this study to determine how the building can best serve us either in modernization, expansion renovation, whatever the study’s going to show, that’s where we’re going to go.” Councilperson Michael Ragaini wants to create a meeting space. He said, “We’re meeting in an office. There’s no way to make a decent-sized meeting room. Each floor is one-third hallway. The building is solid, but it was laid out for a school.” Read more about this story at HudsonValley360.com.