Opposing Opinions: The Casto Home Dilemma
THE CASTO HOME SHOULD NOTE BE DEMOLISHED
By Lynn H. Pace, Council Member District Two
When I was shopping for my first car, I asked my older brother for advice, expecting that he would caution me about spending too much money, To my surprise, he told me "make sure you buy what you like, because you will remember what you got long after you have forgotten what you paid for it.". I believe that advice applies here. Yes, it will cost the City something to save and move the Casto home, but we will remember that we saved that historic structure long after we have forgotten what it cost to do so.
I believe that the Casto Home should not be demolished for two reasons. First, Holladay's history should not be disposable. Preserving this and other historic buildings is a good thing for our community. Holladay was the first local Utah community established outside of Salt Lake City. Our City is named after an early community leader and many of our streets bear the names of those early settlers. Unfortunately, very little tangible evidence of that early history remains. What little does remain, such as the Casto home, should be preserved. Much of what we enjoy in our community today is due to the sacrifice and foresight of those early courageous settlers. We all enjoy the shade and pick the fruit of trees we did not plant. Preserving this historic building is a tangible statement that we honor and remember and value our past. As a community we can either be the ones who act to preserve and save our historical heritage, or the ones who figuratively wad it up and throw it away.
Second, the cost of preserving this building is only a small fraction of the total cost of building the new fire station. In any construction project, the developer is required to purchase and clear the land in question. In this case, the City received the land for free from Salt Lake County. In order to clear the land, the City will need to pay either to move or demolish the building. The extra amount needed to move rather than demolish is a relatively small amount of money, which is already included within the amount of the construction bond. And if we did demolish the Casto home, what would we get instead? A few feet of sidewalk, enough asphalt for a patch of road, or another length of storm drain pipe? The amount of money saved will be too small to pay for any other significant public project. If we save the Casto home, we will have a preserved a tangible tribute and monument to our past; if we demolish it, we won't have anything we can point to that we got instead. My brother was right, we will remember what we got (or didn't get) long after we have forgotten what we paid for it.
The Old Casto Home: Time to Say “Good-bye”
By Steve Gunn, Council Member District Four
Quick: what is the old Casto home? Where is it located? And what is its significance? You can be forgiven for not knowing the answers to these questions; almost no one to whom I have spoken can answer them. But the answers are: (1) the home was built during the mid-Nineteenth Century by one of the early settlers of Holladay, William Casto. (2) It is now located on the site of the Holladay Community Garden adjacent to the Aix la Chapelle Condominiums across the street from Olympus Junior High School on Murray Holladay Road. (Originally it was located on Casto Lane in Holladay. The Home was moved to its present location in about 2001). (3) It is one of the few remaining pioneer-era homes located in Holladay or East Millcreek.
After languishing in obscurity for decades, the Casto Home is about to become a center of attention in Holladay as the City Council considers whether to tear it down or move it again. The building has the misfortune of being located on the proposed site of the new Holladay fire station which the City plans to begin constructing this summer. The Council has been informed that the Home will have to be removed to make way for the station. So far the only relocation sites which have been identified are a parcel behind the Holladay City Hall or some portion of the nearby playing fields. The same contractor who moved the Home from Casto Lane several years ago estimates that the cost of moving the structure will be about $40,000. Add to that the expenses of constructing footings and foundation (say, $20,000) and additional costs to make the building useable and the City could be looking at costs of $60,000-$80,000 to preserve the Casto Home and make it functional.
But once it is preserved, what then? During the decade of its existence at the present location no use has been found for the Home. If it is moved to the City Hall property, the building will sit vacant and boarded up for months—maybe years--while the City plumbs, wires and remodels the interior in a piecemeal fashion or builds up a reserve to pay for a single remodeling effort.
An additional problem is that no use for the building has been identified. Suggestions to date have been to use it as a museum, office space for City Government or a concession stand for users of the playing fields or the new plaza. These suggestions, however, are nothing more than a building seeking a use, not a use seeking a building. In point of fact the building has little practical value and is architecturally unremarkable.
I wish that Holladay could afford to preserve the Casto Home. I also wish we could afford immediately to repair and resurface many of our streets, to build a fire station which is not only functional but beautiful, to landscape Highland Drive, the Village Center and Murray-Holladay Road, to plant trees in Stratton Park and to provide better recreation facilities in the City park. But we can’t do those things—at least not all at once or even in the near future. And we can’t afford to move the Casto Home. We should tear it down and spend the money we save on more important and pressing projects, first and foremost being the construction of a fire station which is both functional and esthetically pleasing.
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