Yesterday, legislators in Orange County, New York failed to stave off the partial demolition of Paul Rudolph's Orange County Government Center. In January, county executive Steven M. Neuhaus vetoed a proposal that would entertain outside bids like Manhattan architect Gene Kaufman's, to purchase, restore, and repurpose the structure, and this was the last chance legislators had to oppose that veto. Kaufman also proposed designing a new government center next door, with a projected budget less than that of the county's current plan to partially demolish and greatly alter it. New York Times architecture critic Michael Kimmelman described the county's plan as "vandalism" in his column on Tuesday.

The plan, which Kimmelman summarized as stripping away "much of its distinctive, corrugated concrete and glass exterior and demolish one of its three pavilions, replacing it with a big, soulless glass box," was briefly opposed, according to Mid-Hudson News, by a "last minute effort by some legislators to terminate the contact" with Clark Patterson Lee, the project architect of the county's proposal. Orange County Legislative Chairman Stephen Brescia is quoted as saying "we are moving ahead and we are ready to go. Demolition is going to start and reconstruction."