Warren County will reimburse the city for razing the Verhine building at 1015 Adams St. under an agreement between the city and the Board of Supervisors, Mayor George Flaggs Jr. said.

Warren County administrator John Smith said the supervisors Monday voted 4-0 to have the city take the building down. In return, he said, the county will reimburse the city the cost of the demolition plus a penalty of up to 25 percent.

Under its code of ordinances, the city charges property owners the cost of the demolition plus a penalty of 25 percent of the cost of removing the building if a city crew or contractor hired by the city demolishes a building.

Flaggs said the city will hire a contractor to remove the building, which was built in the 1890s and was home to Verhine & Verhine law firm from 1991 to 2002, according to city directories. No date was given when a contractor will be hired.

“Because the building was a commercial business at one time, it will also have to be checked for asbestos,” he said, adding a contractor has been hired to examine the building.

The Board of Mayor and Aldermen in June declared the building a menace to the health and safety of the community because its roof was collapsing and city Community Development Director Victor Gray-Lewis told the board he was concerned the entire structure could collapse. The city’s Board of Architectural Review July 15 approved the certificate of appropriateness for demolition filed by the Board of Mayor and Aldermen, clearing the way for the building’s demolition.

The Verhine Building has been in disrepair since the county bought it in 2002, and city and county officials have debated its future since the Warren County Board of Supervisors first sought to raze the building in 2004.

At that time, the supervisors wanted to demolish it and the adjacent old Justice Court Building.

The Board of Architectural Review denied the county’s request because they are in the city’s Grove Street-Jackson Street National Register Historic District and protected under the city’s historic preservation ordinance.

The members urged the county to renovate the buildings. The county instead put both up for sale in 2015, but had no buyers.