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Old City Hall is razed
HARTINGTON — Hartington's onceproud City Hall is now a pile of rubble.
Justin Slagle, of Slagle Dirt Work and Hauling, took a modern-day sledgehammer to the structure Monday morning. He had spent about a week preparing the building for demolition.
As the building came down, a bit of a surprise was discovered. It appears that a mural of some sort once decorated the east wall of the Air Pro Heating and Cooling building.
The old city shop was originally constructed in the early 1900s as a livery. It eventually became the office and warehouse for the Cedar-Knox Public Power District. Cedar-Knox later moved its headquarters to a new building just west of the Post Office and shifted warehouse operations to a site along Highway 84 on the west edge of Hartington.
At that time, the city purchased the former Cedar-Knox facility, moved City Hall out of the City Auditorium, and used the back portion of the building as a city shop.
In 2001, a new Cedar-Knox office complex was completed near Highway 84. Cedar-Knox then sold its West State Street building in downtown Hartington to the city to serve as the new City Hall.
The city continued to use the former City Hall building and shop for storage and maintenance.
The old shop was vacated earlier this year after voters approved bonding in 2024 to construct a new city shop. Officials said the aging structure was no longer adequate for the city’s needs.
In May 2024, Hartington voters approved issuing up to $1.3 million in bonds to build a replacement shop. The new seven-bay building is designed to house the city’s fleet of vehicles, equipment and supplies, with additional workspace for maintenance.
City officials later met with representatives from D.A. Davidson of Omaha, a firm specializing in municipal bond work. The company is serving as the bond underwriter and will sell the bonds for the project. The bonds will not exceed 5.5% interest and must be paid off within 20 years.
The former shop stood across the street from the new facility and had deteriorated in recent years, prompting the City Council to move ahead with construction. With the new building now in operation, demolition began on the old facility this week.
City leaders have not yet announced definite plans for the cleared site, however, they anticipate it may simply be used as a parking lot.
