Building
for the Future

CCS’s campus renewal brings sustainability, economic growth, and a creative hub to the region

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Project updates

Mar 2026

Brownfields Abatement 95% completed

Allowing us to start construction this spring with our construction team at Estes and Gallup! The Telegraph building is enrolled in the The Vermont Brownfield Program which encourages the cleanup and redevelopment of contaminated, underutilized properties (brownfields) to foster economic growth and environmental safety. The program is led by Agency of Natural Resources Department of Environmental Conservation and helps transform Vermont’s underutilized properties. As of March 2026, the Brownfields work is 95% complete. CCS worked with Vermont’s Stone Environmental for a comprehensive review and to develop a Corrective Action Plan for the site.

Aug 2025

Building Purchased

Prior to acquition, CCS worked with Horizons Engineers, SRH Law, and the Town of Hartford Planning and Zoning to subdivide the historic Telegraph building from the larger structure and parcel that was built around the original building in the 1960s. CCS purchased the property from Fidium at a below-market rate, thanks to the support from our partners. As part of our campus renewal research, Studio Nexus Architects and Planners of White River Junction worked with CCS on a feasibility study to assess current and future programming need fit for the Telegraph.

  • Arch. Drawing
  • Arch. Drawing

Sep 2024

Ready to Move Forward

Three big milestones allowed CCS to move from planning to the implementation phase:

CCS secured the matching funds required by the Northern Borders Regional Commission (NBRC) for the previously awarded Catalyst Grant, the largest in our capital stack. With this and other requirements in place, NBRC issued a notice to proceed. 

Vermont’s Department of Environmental Protection approved the Corrective Action Plan (CAP), prepared by Stone Environmental for The Center for Cartoon Studies, in association with the Two Rivers Ottauquechee Regional Commission. VT DEC determined that the CAP meets all the requirements of § 35-603 and § 35-606 of the Investigation and Remediation of Contaminated Properties Rule (IRule). Public notice was conducted from August 14, 2024 until September 13, 2024. No comments were received during the public comment period.

May 2022

Energy Analysis Report by BVH Integrated Services completed. 

CCS’s commitment to creating a healthy environment for its community and reducing its carbon footprint has led us to conduct an energy-efficiency study for the renovation of the Old Telegraph. The study has provided us with guidelines for our design planning phase, including phased options towards a Net-Zero Energy building.

Our project rehabilitates a long-dormant 100-year-old building, advancing measurable climate action through adaptive reuse and electrification. By preserving embodied carbon, avoiding demolition waste, and installing high-efficiency HVAC heat pumps and other energy-saving measures identified in our campus efficiency study, the renovation significantly reduces lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions compared to new construction.

Sep 2021

Campus Renewal Plan Launched

CCS’s first class was in Fall of 2005 on leased spaces in the Colodny building (commercial level and basement). CCS invested in retrofitting these spaces to make them usable for its instructional programs, including installing HVAC, an air exchange system, removing asbestos tiling, electrical work, building out the space for a classroom, offices, and a production lab, and many code compliant occupancy upgrades. Despite these crucial improvements, the facilities are inadequate for the level of quality that we need to offer our students, faculty, and staff: the building is not ADA accessible, and the basement floods regularly. 

In 2013, CCS was able to purchase and renovate the Old Post Office building, relocating its classroom to this less vulnerable, accessible space, and allowing it to open the Schulz Library to the public. However, crucial facilities such as the production lab – where students print and bind their projects – had to remain in the Colodny.

The need for an improved campus became more pressing amid recurring destructive floods across the state and increasing competition from larger colleges that were starting to offer degrees in cartooning.

After years of seeking alternatives, we identified the Old Telegraph Building as the ideal location to host our production lab, senior studios, offices, archive, and special collections, CCS had been leasing space in the Telegraph Building for limited use, which gave us a good understanding of the building’s potential. 

The Telegraph is only a block away from CCS’s flagship building – the Old Post Office on South Main St – which allows us to secure CCS’s campus in a highly competitive and limited real-estate historic district and continue to offer an easy, non-vehicle-dependent commute for our students. The Telegraph also offers the opportunity to expand our flexible classroom space for more public-engagement initiatives and to integrate the Applied Cartooning Lab into the school’s daily activities. 

Our established partnership with the Telegraph’s owners, the telecommunications company Fidium (formerly Consolidated Communications), brought forward a timely opportunity to acquire the building and begin envisioning a sustainable future for our campus. 

In 2021, CCS conducted a feasibility study and worked with Studio Nexus on preliminary designs to estimate the project’s cost. With the CCS Board’s unanimous approval and encouragement from town officials, we officially launched our Campus Renewal Plan and started actively fundraising for project.

This year-long journey reflects CCS’s determination in keeping its campus in White River Junction and offering its students an environment where they can thrive. Leaving the leased spaces that saw us grow for the past 20 years will be bittersweet, but we are also happy to give these spaces back to the community and see new tenants take over our formerly loved spaces for the benefit of the town. 

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