08-28-1991 Council Minutes City Facilites Public Hearing

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PUBLIC HEARING FOR PROPOSED CITY FACILITIES — AUGUST 28, 1991 LaDean McWilliams, 1130 Willow Drive South, asked if the Council Chambers scale is correct, and if so, it doesn't look much bigger than it currently is. She asked also if the kitchen /lunchroom would be available to the public during meetings such as St. George's facilities. Boarman explained the basic part of the Council Chambers is the same as present, however there are two portions adjacent with moveable walls for the public or anyone to use for meetings. If a bigger Council meeting were to take place, the wall could be removed and add almost twice as much in seating. Mayor Peterson noted that the rooms would be useable, but not to the scale as St. George's. Basically, the lunchroom /kitchen are to serve the staff during the day. Goetten noted that she had brought this subject up several times at the Design Committee meetings as during the past few years, in her own church, all the meeting rooms are filled all the time, day and night. She felt that a larger Council Chambers that could be divided up would be of a great benefit to the public. She noted that it is important to have the Council Chambers available to the public. Boarman noted that the building is layed out in three parts. This concept says that this building is a community building with public restrooms, bike path outside, eating area for staff during the day and available to the public in the evening.. This meeting center is divisible into three separate rooms. Al Peterson asked if he could now show his graph. Jabbour commented that the Council was not trying to avoid his questions or concerns, but the Council does not feel it is appropriate at this time to redesign City Hall. He noted that they have spent an enormous amount of time to design City Hall. He wanted to talk about the spirit of the building not the actual design. A. Peterson explained he is a State certified building inspector. After looking over the flyer, he started to investigate other cities regarding space for the facilities. Orono's proposed square footage for office and maintenance garages up until tonight 51,500 s.f., which has been changed now to 46,000. He noted that he surveyed 9 cities and averaged out what square footage they are working with, and the average was 19,237 s.f. Orono's proposed facilities would be 239% bigger than the average of those cities. The cities were: Mound, Buffalo, Savage, White Bear Township, Stillwater, Minnetrista, Shorewood, Princeton and Corcoran. He also averaged the population for those cities,, which was 7518 vs. 7285 for Orono. He averaged square miles and Orono's was 18 without the lake vs. 13.2 average for the 9 cities. Corcoran has 36 square miles with 4400 s.f. of maintenance /office /police comparing with Orono at 46,000. Minnetrista is at 32 square miles and total square 7