A longtime fixture in the Washington community is going to be demolished. John Celani, the executive director of the Brownson House, says deciding to tear down the building was the most difficult decision of his life. He says the youth sports facility has been serving kids for nearly one-hundred years. In fact, he says his ties to the Brownson House go back to when he was five-years-old. He says he grew up there, he wrestled there, played football and basketball there, and when he graduated from college, he went to work there. Celani says he’s been working there for some thirty-six-years, but it’s time to make way for something new and more profitable. He says there is too much wrong with the building to invest in repairing it. Celani says the roof is bad; the facade of the building is breaking down, allowing water to get in between the walls; there were cracks in the walls and the boiler went bad. Celani says it made more sense to apply for grant money for a new building, rather than to repair the old one. He says the demolition will only be the red brick building. The gymnasium will not be torn down and the various teams who use it will continue to do so. Celani says they don’t know yet when demolition will begin. He says the bidding process is currently underway and he has no estimate at this time on how much the demolition will cost. Once it’s finished and they move on to the construction of a new building, Celani says that space will likely be used for a parking lot and the new facility will be built across the street. (Photo: Facebook)