In the coming weeks, the University will demolish a century-old building in Johnson City’s Historic District that it purchased about five years ago.

The two-story residential building at 190 Main St. was built in 1925, with an addition built on the house’s east side in 1947, according to a historic guidebook released by Broome County. Like other residential buildings in the area, the structure was likely created by the Endicott-Johnson Corporation to house its factory workers.

Johnson City’s Historic District was established in 2011 by the National and State Registers of Historic Places to commemorate the area’s “industrial, social history and architectural significance between 1888 to 1966.” In 2011, the village passed a landmark preservation law empowering the village’s planning board, with consultation from a mayor-appointed advisory committee, to consider whether historic sites can be altered.

The University Foundation acquired the building in June 2020 for $327,000. In 2021, University President Harvey Stenger told WNBF, a local commercial radio station, that student service or city administrative offices were considered to be housed in the building, saying it was “very attractive” with “a great presence on Main Street.”

A University spokesperson said attempts were made to remodel the building, but significant water damage “caused irreparable harm to the building.”

“The decision was then made to demo it,” the spokesperson, Ryan Yarosh ‘02, MPS ‘09, wrote to Pipe Dream. “We will hold the property and maintain it as green space until a new plan for it develops. The demo will take place in the next few weeks.”

Johnson City’s mayor, Martin Meaney, told WNBF that the village’s Historic Review Board had approved the demolition plan and that the state’s Historic Preservation Office was reviewing the proposal.

The University purchased other Johnson City properties as part of a $100 million effort to build a six-block medical research complex east of the UHS Wilson Medical Center.

“We are securing properties that make sense for our campus,” a University spokesperson told the Press and Sun-Bulletin in 2020. “Some might have a future purpose or use and some need to be acquired and taken down to remove blight as well as provide better access for our campus from Main Street.”

Other University-owned properties in Johnson City have recently been demolished. A two-unit house at 58 Broad St., near the University Health Sciences Campus, was torn down in January and is now used as greenspace. Properties on Corliss Avenue have also been torn down in recent years.