Editor’s Note: This article was updated Dec. 10, 2024, at 9 p.m. to correct the amount of the police station grant.
MOUNT VERNON — Mount Vernon’s city officials on Friday unveiled a conceptual drawing of the proposed City Hall annex and provided timeline information on constructing the new police station, courthouse, and annex.
Safety-service Director Tanner Salyers acknowledged there has been much talk about the three projects, including where, why, and how the city will pay for them.
He said the biggest issue is deciding which building to build first and where it will be located.
The Plaza Building at 5 N. Gay St. houses the municipal court and police department. It faces critical problems.
Salyers said he, Mayor Matt Starr, and City Engineer Brian Ball agreed public and employee safety was the priority. That means services in the Plaza Building must relocate, hence the emphasis on the courthouse/justice center and police station projects.
However, those employees must go somewhere while the city builds those buildings.
To accomplish that, the city will build the annex simultaneously with the new station on Sychar Road.
“We will do these in tandem so we can move the court temporarily into the annex and do joint operations,” Salyers said. “It will be tight, and we recognize that it’s not a great, it’s not a perfect plan, but that’s the situation we’re in.”
After the court moves into the annex, the city will start site prep for the justice center and demolish the building on the parking garage. The garage will have three levels, with the top open to accommodate large vehicles.
City Hall annex
MKC Architects provided initial planning documents for the annex. Salyers emphasized that they are conceptual drawings, not final designs. However, he said MKC incorporated previous public comments and the city’s needs into the concept.
“We’re looking at giving credence to the Curtis building,” Ball said. “The Henry Curtis building is a white building. We’re looking to replicate aspects of that, probably harvest some components from the building and reuse them.”
The city will demolish the current buildings at 10-20 N. Main St. and 6 E. Chestnut St. and build the annex, which will be larger than City Hall and include retail space facing North Main, in their place.
The basement will house an emergency response area and retail and general storage.
Retail space, private offices, a conference room, and work cubicles will occupy the first floor. The tax and water departments will be in the space engineering occupies in City Hall, easily accessible to the public via the Public Square entrance or a North Main entrance into the annex.
Offices for the mayor, safety services, human resources, engineering, and data/IT will occupy the second floor, along with conference space and offices.
The third floor will house city council chambers, meeting spaces, council workspaces, and workstations.
Visitors entering from City Hall can continue into the annex and exit on Chestnut Street. All four floors will offer public restrooms, and all areas will be handicap accessible.
The auditor’s office will remain in its City Hall location.
Legacy project
Salyers said the annex is a more secure, safety-minded building and noted that the project is subject to governmental regulations over which the city has no control.
“So we try to make it work within those confines and how we can make that as accessible and operative to the public in the best of best of ways, most approachable way,” he explained. “But we really want input when it comes to what that facade looks like and what the amenities are.”
Salyers said public input is essential because it is a legacy project that will be around for generations.
“It’s a long-term investment we’re building for the future,” he said.
Mayor Starr said the concept fulfills the city’s mission of providing modern city services while emphasizing continual improvement, customer service, and equitable laws to support citizens and attract investment.
“The magic really is what’s happening in these buildings,” he said. “When we get to the justice center, these are spaces where people are rebuilding their lives … What you see before you is the best we have seen that fits that mission.”
Historical preservation
Salyers appreciates some residents’ belief that the city should maintain the buildings behind City Hall because of their historic value.
“Simultaneously, I don’t think the public is aware of the condition of those buildings,” he said. “They are not in good shape. So even if we selected another site, these buildings would probably still have to come down.”
Ball said two workers from a cleaning crew who did not use rubber gloves were hospitalized within 15 minutes because they picked up a mirror with their bare hands and immediately overdosed.
“There are parts of the building we cannot take the public to. We cannot emphasize enough that several parts of these buildings are unsafe,” he said.
“We can value the contributions that Henry Curtis has made, we can value the contributions that the Tucker family has made, and we can value all these people that have built Mount Vernon,” Salyers said.
“But this is our city, too. We’re going to be paying this tax bill. We can pay homage to the people of the past and the things of the past and our history and our heritage, but it’s our turn. So let’s make a building for our needs for our city now.”
“We don’t have to cling to the past so hard that we can’t let ourselves live in the future,” he added.
Salyers called allegations that the city has not used third-party consultants on the projects “patently false.”
“There have been reports after reports, studies after studies,” he said, acknowledging that much of it is jargon and technical law.
All are publicly available and will be on the city’s website when the city completes the website redesign.
Justice center & EPA grant
Municipal court, probation, and Clerk of Court staff will occupy the annex while the city builds the justice center. That might mean some city services will utilize the retail space or work off-site.
Ball credits the administration’s previous work to upgrade the city’s computer system and add technology as the driving force behind the ability to work offsite.
The city applied for a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency grant for the justice center.
Ball said the program is new and broad in scope. In June, the city put together a list of 18 potential projects. It included sidewalks, the courthouse, and water and sewer line extensions.
“We felt that we told council that these are the things we’re looking at,” Ball said.
The administration whittled the list to seven and intended to apply for all of them. During the process, the EPA updated the rules.
City officials hired an outside grant writer to review the application and provide guidance. Ball said the consultant’s research showed that the EPA denies applications with seven projects and that one project must be more than $10 million.
“We went back through the list together, and there was only one project that was over $10 million,” Ball explained. “When we looked at it from a public safety measure, replacing the Plaza Building was where we ended up. So that’s why we asked for all the money for one project.”
Additionally, Ball said the city risked having to hire a full-time staff of three to monitor and prepare EPA-mandated reports if the city applied for seven projects.
“We simplified the grant. We’re not asking them to pay any of our labor. We’re only asking them for consulting and construction services and that should make the process easier,” he said.
Public involvement
Ball noted the city will use federal and state aid to help pay for the projects and that aid requires public involvement.
“The National Environmental Policy Act enacted in January 1969 requires us to look at alternatives, write decision documents, and publish those for public comment for review by regulatory agencies,” Ball said. “We’re still in the beginning phases of those documents.
“The heavy lift on the public involvement in those documents happens in design.”
The city is ready to start designing the police station and justice center. However, city council members have not authorized the design of the annex. Ball anticipates asking the council for authorization next year.
The administration will launch a listening tour for the facilities in January. Three sessions are scheduled each for January, February, and March.
The January sessions will focus on the police station, the February sessions on the City Hall annex, and the March sessions on the courthouse and justice center.
(Below is a PDF listing the dates of the listening sessions.)
Salyers said city council members are invited to attend the sessions but noted they are also free to schedule meetings. Additionally, the council can give legislation three readings, and the public can speak during the public participation portion of council meetings.
“For any council member to say that we have not been talking about it or that there is no opportunity for the public to talk about it, or that there is never going to be an opportunity for the public to talk about it is not true,” he said.
“We really want the community to come at us and bring their needs, their wants, their concerns. We’re going to process those as we roll through these other phases,” Ball said.
Financing
The city secured a $2 million grant for the police station and hopes to secure a FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency) grant, too.
The financing package for the municipal projects also includes the city’s New Community Authority (NCA).
Under an NCA, property owners in new developments pay an additional fee. The fees go into a special account for services and infrastructure needed to accommodate growth.
The city can use the fees to pay for loans the city secures for the justice center.
Ball said the administration will put together financing packages for each project in the next few weeks and explain them during the public meetings.
The goal is a market basket of down payment, cash, loans, and grants.
“So today, we don’t have the answer to those questions, but as we step through the process, we’ll be able to answer those questions,” Ball said.
“More accuracy will come when the design is done,” Starr added.
Salyers compared the process to a homeowner seeking a mortgage.
“You can’t put together your own mortgage until you know which house you’re going to buy,” he said.
“And that’s where we are. I can’t tell you how much we’re going to pay because I don’t know if we’re going to add another floor, [for example].”
Accurate costs will come after public and city council input.