HomeMy WebLinkAboutA005 - Memo dated October 20, 1992 to City Council - future of public safety building AWS
3
,till. till H Ault
TO: Mayor and City Council
FROM: Steven L. Schainker, City Manager ,
DATE: October 20, 1992
SUBJECT: MANAGER'S ALERT: DISCUSSION OF FUTURE OF PUBLIC
SAFETY BUILDING AT FIFTH & KELLOGG
As a result of your recent goal-setting session with Tim Shields, we have
scheduled November 17 as the date the Council will meet to discuss the future
of the old City hail " blic Safety Building) at Fifth and Kellogg. Since estab-
lishing this meeting, ,I have received a few calls concerning the sequencing of
our discussion regarding this building.
I would offer the following decision-making outline for your consideration.
(1) The first question that should be answered on November 17 is
whether the City Council would like to retain the building or demolish
it. If the City Council chooses to demolish the building, funds
should be budgeted in fiscal year 1993-94 to accomplish this task.
If, however, the Council chooses to retain the building, the second
question must be answered.
(2) If the building is to be retained, the City Council should decide
whether the City will serve as the developer and renovate the
building for future use, or allow some other- public or private entity
to acquire ownership of the building so that it can be redeveloped
and reused. Here again, if the City decides to develop the building,
funds should be included in the upcoming budget to renovate this
facility so that it can be reused for what other purpose the City so
desires. However, if the Council chooses to pass the responsibility
on to another entity to redevelop the old City Hall, then staff should
be directed to prepare an RFP so that all interested parties would
have an opportunity to submit proposals to redevelop this facility for
reuse.
(3) If the City Council decides to utilize the RFP format, then prior to
sending this document out to interested parties, the City Council
should decide whether or not to designate this facility as a local land-
mark. Obviously this designation will have an impact on any future
owners of the building, since it will influence the extent of work that
can be done on the exterior.
I would suggest that the answers to the first two questions be determined at
your November 17 meeting, and that a hearing and final determination on the
landmark issue be resolved at your regular November 24 meeting, should you
decide to retain the building. If the building is designated as a landmark,
then the relevant information will be included in the RFP which will be
distributed to interested parties.
You may have forgotten by now, but there was an application to designate the
Public Safety Building as a local landmark. Back on April 8, 1991, the Historic
Preservation Commission recommended that the Public Safety Building be desig-
nated such, and the Planning and Zoning Commission (at its May 1, 1991,
meeting) concurred. In accordance with the local ordinance, City Council
referred this matter to the State Historical Preservation office on May 14, 1991,
for their review and comment; and on November 6, 1991, the State Historical
Preservation office determined that the PubLic Safety Building would be eligible
for a landmark designation.
I believe we have now fulfilled__ all .the requirements of the law and the City
Council could hold a hearing on this matter on November 24. You have been
delaying any action on this matter until we received the historic inventory
report. This report is now in and indicates that the Public Safety Building
be eligible for the National Register ac well as a local landmark. A copy
of this information will be provided to you prior to your hearing oii the 24th if
you adopt the process I am proposing. -
I trust that this process is acceptable to each of you. If followed, we will be
able to tell citizens who are interested in the Public Safety Building as a land-
mark that the appropriate time for their input would be on November 24. On
November 17, therefore, we would restrict our discussions to the first two
questions outlined above.
You will recall that we had hoped to discuss two issues at this meeting:
Cy-Ride routes as well as the disposition of the Public Safety Building. I
would suggest that we start the meeting with a discussion of the Cy-Ride
routes. I believe it will be a lengthy discussion and, therefore, should be
discussed when you are "fresh." This will allow time for those individuals
interested in discussing the Public Safety Building to meet at a later hour after
they are off work.
If you have any questions regarding my suggested process, please give me a
call. Otherwise, I will move ahead to formalize this process.
/lw
c: Brian O'Connell, Planning & Housing Director