Planning Commission Regular Meeting/Work Session

Paul NabtistaffThose are shown in orange. And then the more general capital comments are shown in blue. And I will summarize those. For those that are related to specific projects, the Planning Commission asked to include comments about the property yard feasibility study and encouraging support for what comes out of that, recognizing that there are ever-increasing floodplain issues on the current site. regarding fire station three their recommendation to support that project due to the condition and issues with the current facility and to further consider other needs of the city and opportunities to use the fire station site in the redevelopment effort for that project and then lastly the recommendation to support the Willard Sherwood Community Center as that

Matthew RiceYeah, so we received an email just with information regarding the wording of our recommendation for Fire Station 3. I think I wanted to save my comments for an open meeting and avoid any statements of my own that might be considered deliberative. Most of all, I think that the accreditation of the fire department and the police department carry a fairly significant price for us in terms of insurance that we pay as a city. so there are several ratings and things that the city holds that make a fairly big impact financially you know the bond rating is the one we talk about the most but i think having an up-to-date facility very much does feed into accreditation which has a very direct financial impact so

it's always great to have a new fire station it's always great to have a new school it's nice to have you know new facilities but very few facilities have a direct connection to a financial cost like this and so i think um supporting a station that can function as a 21st century fire station is relatively important if just from a financial perspective um we did talk during our last meeting about the where we had the assistant chief here as a guest about the coverage of the fire and the cooperative agreement that we have with the county to service residents in the county. What it comes down to is I think this is a priority is sort of much more than just the readiness and the response times. It really is there's a financial side to this that I think is important.

Paul CunninghamA thought as it bears on both of those projects. As Mr. Rice has indicated, the fire station is significant. From what I read in the email, in order not to jeopardize the certification of the fire department, it needed to meet the requirements, all of the code requirements at the time it was built, which I believe it did because they've been certified since then. What is lacking in that statement is that if you really get old enough, the current code and standards is a great distance removed from what was originally approved. And that's the area I think we're getting to on the fire station, that we are reaching sufficient age in that, that it's important if we're going to maintain a city that we maintain adequate facilities to meet the need.

Our support for the fire station, as I would view it, is to meet the need. Does that mean we have to build a new fire station next year? No. Two years? Three years? No. We need to put it into the hopper and put sufficient emphasis on it that the planning is moving forward so that we're taking action in this area. The exact timing of that action is not as important as I view it as that we are taking action and making progress in reaching the goal. So it's not intended to drive this year's budget or next year's budget. It's intended to be put in the hopper so that the adjustments can be made and we ensure that it stays there. And I think much the same is with Willard Sherwood in moving forward on that as we

James Featherjust because you've each had some of your own thoughts and insights on some of the things that are on the list and why they're on the list. And I would prefer you express them than me to try to do that. For example, Mr. Rice, you've talked a lot about the fire station. You have some well-articulated thoughts on that. I think we all have insights into the Willard Sherwood Center. and Ms. Lockhart, I know you've expressed some of those very well. So I just wanted to figure out how to share the joy. I shouldn't be the only one to do the talking. I know when the Environmental Sustainability Committee meets with them, they go around the room and they each have something to say, and I'd like to continue that.