ADAMS -- When the roads leading to the summit of Mount Greylock reopen this spring for the first time in two years, one question will be whether anyone will be at Bascom Lodge to greet visitors as they reach the top of the state's highest peak.

Officials with the state's Historical Curatorship program were expected to announce the individual or group that had been selected to maintain and operate the 5,800-square-foot lodge under a multi-year lease by mid-February. A selection had yet to be announced as of Tuesday.

"The Bascom Lodge curatorship is more complicated than most other Historic Curatorship projects," said Wendy Fox, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Conservation and Recreation. "It involves running a lodge and restaurant at the top of a mountain, whereas most other projects involve single-family homes open to the public a few times a year. Because of the complexity of this project, more time is needed to review the applications."

She did not give a timetable for a final selection.

The state's Historic Curatorship program allows outside parties to apply to receive a long-term lease on properties in exchange for rehabilitation and maintenance services. The lease for Bascom Lodge would last 25 to 30 years.

In January, Kevin M. Allen, Historic Curatorship program manager, identified the two finalists for the project as Gerry Sanchez, owner of Polonia Development and Preservation Services Co., and a partnership between brothers John and Peter Dudek and Brad Parsons. Calls and e-mails to Allen went unanswered on Monday.

The Dudeks and Parsons, who attended an open house at the lodge last August, said they were interested in operating a mountaintop bed and breakfast. At the same open house, Sanchez expressed interest in a 39-year lease for the lodge. Sanchez has already invested in Adams with the current restoration of the Jones Block and Carlow Building on Park Street into commercial space and apartments. He also has been interested in buying the former Waverly Fabrics mill on Hoosac Street with the intention of performing a similar renovation.

Bascom Lodge, built in the mid-1930s by the Civil Conservation Crops, has traditionally served 250,000 annual visitors, a majority of whom have been hikers of the Appalachian Trail. The lodge has 35 bunks, a kitchen, dining room, enclosed porch, store area and living quarters for the lodge manager.

It was last operated by Nature's Classroom, an environmental education program for schoolchildren, which ended its association with the lodge in 2006, when the state announced it would close the mountain summit as it repaired and refurbished the roads leading to the top.

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