The third City Hall community meeting attracted over 40 guests to Cedar Way Elementary School for an interactive discussion on the latest proposals put forth by the City Hall Advisory Committee.
At the May 10 community meeting, ARC Architects presented further refined preliminary layouts for a future City Hall following public input from the April 20 community meeting. Two concepts featured stand-alone City Hall layouts and the third showed City Hall attached to the Police Station. Each drawing showed parking and vehicle traffic circulation.
The City Hall Advisory Committee presented the latest “base model” City Hall with reductions that lowered the original cost estimate by about 10 percent. The current estimate of a stand-alone City Hall with 19,210 square feet is about $11.6 million. After much discussion at their May 4 meeting, the Committee unanimously approved a motion to put forth this “base model” proposal and another option that would add about 3,100 square feet of space for the Police Department. The cost estimate for the City Hall with added space for the Police Department is about $13.4 million.
The Committee seeks feedback from the public on both proposals along with the notion of recommending to City Council that two propositions be placed on the November ballot. The latter idea was developed in response to residents who expressed that they would like a City Hall and added Police Department space considered separately. Under this scenario, the first proposition would be for a stand-alone City Hall to address the financial challenge of only having four years of levy revenue to continue renting. The second proposition could be contingent upon the City Hall measure passing since the Police Department currently has a permanent building even though it is aging and has insufficient space.
The Committee members and city staff responded to a variety of questions about project costs and components, financing, space needs, property taxes, and ballot language.
The Committee meets next on May 18 (6:30 p.m., Interim City Hall) followed by an open house on June 5, from 6:00 – 7:00 p.m. at Interim City Hall. The open house will be followed by the Committee’s recommendation to the City Council as part of the Council meeting. In addition, the Committee has another neighborhood “chat” scheduled at Sorelli Pizza on Wednesday, May 17 from 6:30 – 8:00 p.m.
An online comment form is available on the City Hall Advisory Committee webpage at www.cityofmlt.com/1899. The city encourages everyone to participate. Regular project updates continue to be posted.
For more information, please email cityhall2017@ci.mlt.wa.us or call Community Relations Director Virginia Olsen at (425) 744-6206.
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