WEST FAIRLEE — During the more than 15 years Bean Hall has sat vacant in the center of West Fairlee, community members have made multiple attempts to revitalize the historic edifice.

The work needed to stabilize the three-story building — including reinforcing the floors so that they handle a useable amount of people in the space — has been daunting for a town of fewer than 650 people.

But now town residents are feeling more hopeful about Bean Hall’s possibilities after the West Fairlee Historical Society was awarded about $475,000 in funding from the Village Trust Initiative, a new program that will distribute $10 million in Congressionally Directed Spending that U.S. Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., obtained in 2023 before leaving office.

“People are really excited,” Jen Shatney, the historical society’s treasurer, said in a phone interview this week.

Ideas for the space are still under discussion and in the coming months those involved with the Bean Hall Community Center project will be asking residents for their thoughts. There is talk of using the first floor for a business of some sort, bringing back community meals and renovating the stage on the second floor. Above all, the goal is to have a space where community members can gather once again.

“Over the years Bean Hall has been closed, I think quite a few people have come to understand it sort of formed a hub for the village and the town and that piece is missing,” Shatney said. “It’s a lot harder to gather in a group and find commonalities that unite us as a town.”

Bean Hall was built in the early 1900s and is on the register of historic places. It housed the town offices until 2008 when it was deemed structurally unsound and residents voted against funding its repairs. Instead, residents approved a plan to renovate the old elementary school for the town offices at a lower cost.

Over the years, affection for Bean Hall has remained strong among residents, including Jillian Hatch.

“It’s like a miracle,” Hatch said about the funding. “It seems like a dream because the stakes are so high and you just want a chance. You just want to be chosen and given that chance and we have been.”

The funding will support pre-development work at Bean Hall, including engineering assessments, and the start of the project’s implementation once community organizations come up with a plan for the hall’s use.

“It’s an ambitious project. It’s a big building. This money is not going to put them over the top,” said Ben Doyle, president of the Preservation Trust of Vermont, said in a phone interview this week. “It’s a good start but it’s going to take additional local funding, state funding, federal funding. This will be a good start people can line up behind.”

It is too soon to say how much it will cost to renovate Bean Hall, which measures about 7,500 square feet, not including the basement, Shatney said. The grant will allow the group to do the research to figure out more specific cost estimates.

The Preservation Trust of Vermont is one of three nonprofit organizations, along with the Vermont Council on Rural Development and the Vermont Community Foundation, that are distributing the $10 million in funding to 20 rural communities with fewer than 2,500 people to support community projects.

West Fairlee was part of the first cohort of seven towns awarded funding. Other projects include general store projects in Reading and Benson, the Gilman Middle School reuse project in Lunenburg, a schoolhouse rehabilitation project in Wolcott, a church and parsonage adaptive reuse project in Greensboro Bend, and the Snowville Hotel housing and community space project in Braintree.

“The whole idea behind it is that in Vermont, most rural communities often times have the hardest time pulling down federal funding and often lack the capacity to spearhead community and economic development projects,” Doyle said.

One of the goals of the Village Trust Initiative is to “do as much of the pre-development work and the logistical work as we can so it makes it as easy as possible for the communities to do this work,” Doyle said. Staff at the three nonprofits will provide project management skills and help connect community groups with potential funding sources.

That’s one of the parts of the project Shatney is most excited about. For example, grant applications can be pretty technical and often require a lot of time to fill out.

“Having that legal and technical knowledge that we’re going to receive through the Village Trust Initiative is just a game changer,” she said. “You have people you can call on who can reliably give you the information you need and work as a partner to help move the project forward.”

Liz Sauchelli can be reached at esauchelli@vnews.com or 603-727-3221.