Adams Ale House Slated to Reopen Under New Management
ADAMS, Mass. — The Adams Ale House is slated to reopen under new management after months of being closed.
Pub owner Nathan Girard on Wednesday told the Board of Selectmen that he plans to lease the building to a group that will run it under the same name. Girard was applying for an all-alcohol and entertainment license from the board, which was acting as the Licensing Board.
"After an extensive search I think that we have found the right people," Girard said.
The restaurant abruptly closed last July purportedly for renovations and then for re-staffing. On Wednesday, Girard said he had just become too busy to run a restaurant.
"When I was operating the place, I quite enjoyed it, but I got drawn in different directions," he said. "Family and things like that ... I hope they are successful and I hope to be a patron instead of an operator."
The restaurant had opened in the former Saints Hall and was run by Girard and two others who later left. Girard said he has been looking for people to lease to and believes he found the right match.
"I have been searching for a leasee for quite a while and we found a couple of people but after doing some vetting, we realized they weren't the right people," he said.
Girard said he is unsure what the new operators will carry over and what they will change but that they have total freedom.
"Obviously, they have their own ideas with food and things of the like," he said. "But they are going to keep the name but they may intend to change it down the road. ... I gave them no restrictions."
He did not want to release the name of the new leasee at this time but said they were local and experienced in running restaurants.
"They have tons of experience in relation to the restaurant business and they are local," he said. "They have been doing this for a long time and I hope they intend to hire local people and run a successful restaurant."
The Selectmen could not vote on the licenses because of an error in the application process. Abutters were not properly notified.
Girard also did not have an opening date.
The public hearing was tabled until later in February.
The board also made an $8,400 reserve fund transfer for the town clerk to fund additional elections this year.
Interim Town Administrator Donna Cesan had a few smaller transfers for the Selectmen and asked for $9,000 for elevator repair work at the Memorial Building and $6,800 to continue to rent the heating unit.
"We cut out the number expended for the past three years so now we have to pay the piper," she said. "It was removed from the budget, but we still have the expense."
Cesan also asked for $5,300 to make repairs at the Harmony Street Pump station because of residents flushing disposable wipes down the toilet and $4,000 to close out engineering payments for the Hoosac Valley Elementary School boiler room roof project.
In other business:
• The Selectmen appointed Glen Diehl and Jacob Levesque to the Zoning Board of Appeals. The board held interviews for the vacant seats and settled on these two candidates.
Diehl will take the full seat while Levesque will finish out a term that ends June 30.
• The board elected member Christine Hoyt to the Adams-Cheshire Regional School District Superintendent Search Committee.
Hoyt said the town still needs a resident to appoint to the committee because some possible candidates backed out.
"It will be pretty labor intensive and the individuals that I spoke with looked at their schedules and felt that they would not be able to commit so it so anyone that is interested I would be glad to share the information," she said.
Tags: alcohol license, license board, restaurants,
