CC Minutes - 10/29/03 WS - Laserfiche WebLink

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Ms. Bettman indicated tentative support for the staff recommendation. However, she wanted to expand the options before the council. She wanted to move forward with both a new police station and a new city hall. She said that her ultimate support for the project would be based on the final funding package. Ms. Bettman said she had informally polled some constituents who had supported past capital expenditures, but were tentative in their support for the police station. She thought it would be a ~hard sell" and did not want to see a bond measure placed on a ballot only to fail. Ms. Bettman had wanted the project included in the urban renewal district because she thought that would demonstrate to the voters that the cost of the facility would be offset by other funding sources. She asked staff to develop cost estimates for a combined police station/city hall. She suggested that if the City were to build one large building to replace the existing City Hall, it would be cleaner and the City would not be required to continue to maintain the existing building. Ms. Nathanson referred to Mr. Carlson's remarks about downsizing the project to reduce costs, and suggested that would raise the question of whether the City was being short-sighted by not building out to the original estimated need. She suggested that the City could build a shell that it left empty or occupied with an interim activity. Ms. Nathanson asked staff to discuss the impact of building additional satellite police stations, and if that reduced the need for space in a centralized building. Speaking to the latter question, Mr. Svendsen indicated that because of the scale of the satellite stations, they did not reduce the business of the police headquarters. Speaking to the first question, Mr. Svendsen said that an earlier option considered by staff was to reduce the project to a mid-sized range, but staff continued to look at the future needs of the department and wanted to size the building for the future, not just the short-term. Mr. Penwell added that staff had worked with architects to review the space needs assessment again and looked to see where space could be reduced as a result of changes in police operations, and concluded that with the current budget and realistic projections of the future, 92,000 square feet was the appropriate size. He indicated that the planning horizon used was 15 years. Ms. Nathanson suggested that the public would question the City's need for an exclusive use building, and asked why it was a good idea for the City to continue to plan for an exclusive use building. Mr. Svendsen said that there were building code issues related to the mixing of uses that was separate from the question of how the building would be used operationally. He believed there were co-location opportunities and their cost implications that could be discussed. Speaking on the topic of security, which had grown as an issue over the last few years, Mr. Svendsen noted the security issues created by mixing public accessibility for police and non-police functions. He deferred to Lieutenant Rick Siel for further comment. Lieutenant Siel spoke to the issue of satellite stations, saying the establishment of precincts or the expansion of substations to accommodate a wider range of police functions generally was not cost- effective until the police agency and the city involved reached a certain size. He did not see that happening in Eugene. Lieutenant Siel anticipated that there may be more substations or they could be used differently, but he did not think they would increase in size. Regarding the issue of security, he said that a new city hall with multiple functions would have to be built to a seismic level that a police station did not require, which created an additional cost. Other functions would increase the MINUTES--Eugene City Council October 29, 2003 Page 3 Work Session