ALBANY — Nearly a year after a New York City man bought the hulking eyesore punctuating the city skyline, the Central Warehouse continues to accrue back taxes while no plans for revitalizing it have been submitted.

Evan Blum purchased the vacant building off Montgomery Street for $1 in August under the name Phoenix of Albany LLC from Sunmark Federal Credit Union, according to Albany County records. At the time, Blum touted turning the 11-story warehouse into a massive art project on the outside and a hub for local artists to display their work inside.

When Blum bought the former food cold-storage site, he assumed the delinquent taxes that date back to 2011. The property has since accrued additional charges, bringing the total to $332,512, county records show.

“It’s all going to get resolved shortly. What we’re doing, we’re going to pay little by little,” Blum said Thursday. “We’re in the process of finishing getting approvals that we need to get so we can generate funds.”

Blum wasn’t specific about what those approvals entail, but there are no building permits submitted to the city Building and Regulatory Compliance Department and no plans for reuse have been submitted to the planning department.

Albany County officials said the property isn’t eligible for a payment plan to pay the back taxes incrementally because of how long they’ve been left unpaid.

“I’m wrestling with a very unwieldy beast at the moment,” Blum said. “We’re working on many things that are going to be very positive. It just requires a little bit of patience, and then everything will get taken care of.”

Mayor Kathy Sheehan said she last spoke with Blum in February about grant opportunities he could possibly pursue.

"We know that this is a building that's going to require some help to be able to bring it back online, and we want to be as helpful as we can," she said, noting that the planning department as well as Capitalize Albany Corp. stands ready to assist.

Nothing has been submitted.

"Right now, we're not seeing any movement whatsoever, so it is a concern," Sheehan said.

Located between downtown and Interstate-787, the 500,000-square-foot building with its many broken windows is hard to miss. It has been vacant since at least the 1990s and repeatedly tagged by graffiti artists.

For decades, the building has bounced to various owners with promises to put the property back into productive use – from retail to loft apartments. Yet nothing has panned out; developers facing a major rehab that possibly includes the removal of asbestos. It’s gone into foreclosure at least twice, county records show.

"Clearly this is a key building that we want to see revitalized," Sheehan said, noting projects already in the works in the area like the Albany Skyway and Capital Repertory Theatre moving to the warehouse district. "Oftentimes these things can take longer than we anticipate and go more slowly than people want, but certainly there are funding resources available that have deadlines attached to them."

Blum remained confident that his plans will come to fruition, which is part of his growing eclectic business that involves plucking pieces of history from buildings in New York City before demolition.

The New York Times recently described Blum's business, Demolition Depot & Irreplaceable Artifacts, as having the nation's largest assortment of historic windows, doors, toilets, tubs and light fixtures, and even entire saloon bars, building facades and paneled room interiors once owned by the rich and famous.

“We’re going to do this in phases. First phase is to clean up the place, make it look presentable and get it to function,” Blum said. “I believe it will transform the arts scene up there.”