Fire Territory Looks At Costs To Repair Issues At Station 2
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David Slone-dslone@timesuniononline.com
Examining options and repairing Warsaw-Wayne Fire Territory station No. 2 has been divided into phases, and the Territory board on Tuesday approved moving forward with phase I.
The contract with Design Collaborative for architectural and engineering services is for $21,172, and will go before the Board of Public Works and Safety for its approval, too.
Mayor Joe Thallemer reminded the WWFT board that they talked in August about station No. 2, on East Center Street, getting older and the structure having issues with rusting and settling.
“The idea is to get a pretty comprehensive architectural idea of what it’s going to take to replace or, I should say, rework some of these problems or replace,” Thallemer said.
For the $21,172, Design Collaborative will conduct site visits to verify conditions of the site and oversee a 3D scan of the building; procure a site survey and soil borings; lead a design kickoff meeting; provide a maximum of two conceptual site plans and floor plan layouts; develop a preliminary code study; develop initial estimate of probable construction costs; and attend and present the schematic design to the WWFT board and the Board of Works.
Fire Chief Mike Wilson said, “We really need them to come in and start phase I so we can make a determination on exactly what is completely wrong and what can’t be completely done.”
He said they ran it through the city planner and he’s in agreement with them.
Thallemer said, “So at the end, they’re going to have pretty much site construction documents as well as administrating the bidding phase.”
If the Fire Territory chooses to stay with Design Collaborative throughout the whole process, Wilson said, “The first phase is, they need to come in and look at the structure, do the things to be able to move on phase II and phase III. There will be a sit-down with the Territory board and our department at the end of dealing with phase I before they move on to anything else.”
He said the Territory board will have the option to decide on moving forward with phases II and III, depending on what Design Collaborative comes back with.
Thallemer mentioned that Design Collaborative has an estimate at this time that construction costs will be $1.5 million.
He pointed out that he felt the block construction building of station No. 3 will be long-lasting, sturdy and stable and won’t have to “go through this process of, which we did already at station 1, and now at station 2. We’ve got a million and a half to get it up to snuff. It would have been a good idea to go block construction right out of the shoot.
“As we’ve talked, there’s a lot of moisture and condensation in a fire building. Garage doors going up and down. There’s different heat areas. There’s a lot of cold air coming in, and there’s just condensation galore on the metal. Not just the sheeting but the foundational structural steel is impacted as well. I know that’s what we ran into at station 1,” Thallemer said.
He said it makes a lot of sense for Design Collaborative to come in and really look at where the building stands at this point.
Mike Klondaris, city council representative to the board, said there’s also salt in the winter that gets on the trucks and then is hosed off in the station, which gets on the steel.
He asked Wilson when would Design Collaborative start, and Wilson replied they’d start right away after the contract went to the Board of Works.
Phase I will take about eight weeks to complete, Thallemer said.
“We’ll know a lot by the end of that,” Klondaris said.
In another bit of business, Fire Territory Administrative Assistant Shirley Fetrow reminded the board of Family Safety Day, which is 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday at Center Lake Pavilion. All the emergency services will be on hand.
“This should be another good year,” she said.
Wilson said Fetrow has extended the Family Safety Day’s footprint in the park to the west. “We’re looking for a big crowd,” he said.
Thallemer said the event grows every year and the kids really do enjoy it. It’s a great program with a lot of participation, he said.
