Borough Facilities Committee

August 10, 2007 minutes

 

Borough Hall Meeting room.  Webb, McWilliams, Tovo, Urankar, Emr and Shaw

 

 

See attached agenda.  Richard Urankar served as meeting facilitator and secretary for the first meeting.  Committee organization and administrative responsibilities will be determined at the next meeting.

 

The members discussed the purpose of the committee and our charge.  Councilman Shaw expressed the opinion, with others in agreement, that we were charged by the Borough Council to review the current Borough Hall usage and needs, and make a recommendation to Council on how to best solve the problem(s). 

 

It was agreed that the current Council felt there was a need to do something to improve the Borough Hall facility, but Council did not know exactly what that would be.

 

Councilman Shaw further stated that the committee was charged to review all former Borough Hall remodeling plans, and if the Board of Education, the Fire Department and/or the Police Department should be moved out of the existing building.  The majority of the Council, per the discussion at the July Council meeting, thought a reasonable budget for the possible remodeling should be between $1.0 and $1.5 million.

 

Discussions pursued on how to best continue. 

 

Councilwoman Emr thought the committee should move in steps by first identifying established conditions and needs of the facility.  She also thought public communication was critical and suggested that we establish a committee page on the Borough Web Site.  Additionally, Councilwoman Emr thought the budget may be low, that we should ask the Board of Education to contribute financially to the improvements and that the committee should have a public member.

 

Chief Tovo commented that he thought the Council had decided to “move forward” with improving the facility and that for the first time there was a commitment to fund the improvements.  He suggested the committee not spend much time re-identifying the building users needs, since those were well documented in previous studies.  The Chief went on to say that he thought there were three likely options:

            1 – build the previously discussed and designed Borough Hall Annex,

            2 – design and build a new Police Annex in the DPW front yard, or

            3 – design and build a new combined facility in the DPW front yard for the Police

      Department, Municipal Courts and Borough Council meetings.

 

 

 

Brief, but general discussed ensued regarding these proposed options, but specific discussion was deferred for future meetings when additional information would be available.  Chief Tovo also stated that he thought the committee could save meeting time if we waited for preliminary and general cost estimates on the various options to be available before discussing as a group.

 

Councilman Urankar commented that the majority of the Borough Council voted against funding Borough Hall improvements in 2006 because the project was not well defined at that time, nor were the expected costs well documented.  He suggested that the committee try to be as specific as possible during our work. 

 

Fire Department representative Doug McWilliams commented that, in his opinion, the committee’s work should be driven by meeting the documented needs of the users as a primary objective, with other considerations being secondary objectives.

 

Chief Tovo and Doug McWilliams stated that at least one municipal and/or Board of Ed function needed to move out of Borough Hall to realistically solve the space needs in the long run.

 

A discussion about a committee timeline was discussed.   Borough Manager Gary Webb stated, and it was generally agreed, that the committee should try to make a recommendation to the Borough Council by December of 2007 so that funding could be included in the 2008 budget discussions, and if approved, improvements made to the building in 2008/2009.

 

The committee decided to schedule regular committee meetings on the Fridays before the regularly scheduled Borough Council meetings at 8:30am, at Borough Hall.

 

The next meeting is scheduled for August 24^th, and, at that meeting:

            1 – Councilman Shaw and Councilwoman Emr will present a summary of previously identified Borough Hall user needs,

            2 – Chief Tovo, Manager Gary Webb and Councilman Urankar will present an outline of timing issues to be considered,

            3 – The committee structure and work responsibilities will be determined, including whether additional members should be added to the committee from the public, Board of Education and/or other user groups, and

            4 - How to communicate with and educate the public about the committee’s work will be discussed.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

File Name: BC.Facilities.Minutes.081007