The last shift of workers punched out more than 15 years ago and now the building housing the former Alumax manufacturing plant is coming down. At its peak, Alumax employed about 200 people including union and management workers.

Cambria Contracting of Lockport won the bid to demolish the building and according to Chautauqua, NY County Executive Greg Edwards, it won't cost county taxpayers anything.

"The good news is the scrap value of building materials exceeded their cost of demolition," Edwards said. "They were able to realize a margin which allowed them to pay us $27,000 and they won the bid on those terms."

Edwards said asbestos was removed earlier as part of an agreement with Alumax owner Alcoa and DEC Region 9 officials prior to the county purchasing the property. The Alumax demolition is expected to be finished in 60 days.

The Alumax demolition is hopefully just the start of demolition on the brownfields site located east of South Roberts Road in the city of Dunkirk. Buildings that housed the former Roblin Steel company and Edgewood Warehouse are also in the county's sights.

"Roblin and Edgewood are being analyzed right now to see if we can take similar steps with those by coordinating with the DEC and our technical consultants TVGA, and local development and manufacturing concerns, to see if we can package those up to get property demolition and the resulting acreage can be developed to increase tax base and increase jobs. ... It's a very complex process because it involves brownfield development," Edwards said. "That's what we're looking at right now, to see if we can get those demolished and removed without impacting negatively on our taxpayers and open the door on previously contaminated sites. I'm very encouraged about the progress on this 25-plus acre site.

"I'm thrilled that the projects are going forward in an aggressive way, that's great news for everybody in Chautauqua County."