“We are evaluating the options,” said City Councilman Dave Butterbaugh. “Whether for sale or maybe for city use.”

ICE ceased operations there at the beginning of the year, relocating those operations to Georgia, then turned the facility back to the city a few months ago, according to City Manager Chris McGuire.

The city would like to repurpose the buildings on the 5.6-acre property, which was appraised at $2.3 million, and ideally get it back on the tax rolls, McGuire said.

More details on the possibilities will be coming soon, according to McGuire.

The former ICE Armory Operations facility along East Chestnut Avenue in Altoona is being evaluated for a potential sale or use by the city. Mirror photo by Patrick Waksmunski

ICE Armory Operations began in 2017 at the site, which handled “the acquisition, testing, issuance and maintenance of all ICE-owned firearms, law enforcement equipment and ammunition,” according to a 2017 news release from the agency.

The site was also used for storage of seized weapons, McGuire said.

The facility had been linked to immigration since July 1994, when ICE predecessor Immigration and Naturalization Service turned it into a weapons repair facility, according to information from Mirror archives.

From 1947 until shortly before INS took it over, the property was the site of a U.S. Naval Reserve Training Center, according to information provided by local historian Michael Farrow, who researched archives of the Altoona Tribune; and the Mirror archives.

Long before, the property became the site of the Altoona Astronomic Station, according to a pamphlet written by Farrow.

The former ICE Armory Operations facility along East Chestnut Avenue in Altoona is being evaluated for a potential sale or use by the city. Mirror photo by Patrick Waksmunski

In 1890, at the request of the Pennsylvania Railroad, the U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey established a coordinate marker on the property, consisting of a copper bolt with an incised cross set in the crotch of an upright U-shaped block of sandstone, according to a pamphlet by Farrow. On the pier was carved “Lat 40 degrees 31′ 45″ 48′” ; Long 78 degrees 23′ 12: 79′” Altitude 1,288.1 FT,” according to Farrow. It required six days of signals to establish the longitude and six nights of star observations to establish the latitude.

The pier was removed when PennDOT widened Chestnut Avenue to four lanes about two decades ago.

It’s now set in a garden at Baker Mansion, home to the Blair County Historical Society.

Mirror Staff Writer William Kibler is at 814-949-7038.