CANAJOHARIE — A downstate firm will be paid roughly $100,000 to develop a plan for the reuse of Beech-Nut facilities, the Hero Group/Beech-Nut announced.

Corporate Properties LLC. of New York City, a company with experience tackling difficult redevelopment projects, will do the study with plans to make recommendations in early November.

Some companies simply put a “for sale” sign on properties they intend to abandon, said Spiros Antoniadis, a senior managing director at Corporate Properties LLC.

“They’re taking a much more proactive approach in doing this by retaining people who have had some experience with some unusual and complicated properties,” Antoniadis said Wednesday.

“What we’re doing is basically trying to put together an exit strategy and comprehensive plan that makes this an asset that can be marketed,” Antoniadis said.

Beech-Nut is in the process of building a new facility in the Florida Business Park at the opposite end of Montgomery County.

The company’s departure from Canajoharie, where it has operated for more than 100 years, caused so much apprehension among village officials they filed a lawsuit last week against the Hero Group, the Montgomery County Industrial Development Agency, Empire State Development and the Florida Town Planning Board.

The lawsuit calls into question how much attention was paid to the impact on the village during the project’s environmental review.

Antoniadis said in his work, he’s seen the impact the loss of major employers has on communities.

“In terms of jobs going elsewhere, I’ve worked in communities as small as Canajoharie and I’ve worked in places where there were 10,000 to 15,000 people. Whatever the size of the company is, if they’re the main employer, that has a real effect,” Antoniadis said.

“That doesn’t mean nothing can be done. We’ll be working with the community to find out what is a realistic solution,” Antoniadis said.

Canajoharie-based Arkell Hall Foundation Director Joe Santangelo, one of several members of a committee that’s been focusing on the village in light of the company’s impending departure, said he sees promise in employing professionals accustomed to this type of work.

“I’m not an expert in these things, but I think they do more of a study into what the possibilities may be and what opportunities there are out there,” Santangelo said.

“They kind of give the seller and the community a direction in which they can head much more so than a marketing firm just taking over the building.

“So it’s ideas, basically, and good knowledgeable background I think they bring to the table,” Santangelo said.

Village Mayor Leigh Fuller said he believes there is a focus on using the facility for food processing work. This type of industry requires a large volume of water and wastewater services, Fuller said.

The village is hoping to avoid “right sizing” its infrastructure which, through the sale of water and sewer services, provides a large revenue source for Canajoharie.

“We’re hoping for the best,” Fuller said.