Special
Meeting
Meeting was called to order at 11:05 A. M. by Chairman Daniels followed by the Salute to the Flag.
The Clerk took Roll Call with all members recorded as present except Mr. Dafoe, Mr. Loomis and Mr. Willcox recorded absent.
PRIVILEGE OF THE FLOOR
Carol
Deloff, Director of the Area Agency on Aging spoke in regards to Agenda No. 6.
She outlined her involvement with the Human Services Committee, the Architect
with Barton & Loguidice and interaction with the Buildings & Grounds
Committee resulting in six drafts to move to
Elizabeth
Larkin,
Chairman
Daniels introduced Joe Maryak and Dean Mason from Barton & Loguidice to
update legislators on DMV, Moose property and study of the
With
the aid of maps of the proposed sites, Mr. Maryak described the proposal for
DMV noting the location of the building and surrounding parking area. He said
they have not yet developed a real plan, just the size building that was
needed. He said that DMV requires 4,000 square feet with a drive through
proposal. The identified need to store 31 new voting machines is estimated to
add another 1,600 square feet. He said that the Election Office presently has
960 square feet so we are talking about adding another 1,000 square feet to
total 2,600 and combined total for the building being 6,600 square feet. He
said there will be shared areas with bathrooms, break rooms and mechanical
room bringing the total to 7,500 square feet that could be reduced once we
allocate the space. The proposal includes 40 parking spaces. He added that the
building is placed on the property in conformance with the City zoning codes
but there is a possibility to alter the set back.
Ms.
Tytler asked if we alter the set back does that affect the drive through. Mr.
Maryak answered no because it is necessary for the drive through to be on that
side. Mr. Tagliente asked what would be the result if we just stay with DMV.
Mr. Maryak said that it would be half the size. Mr. Tagliente questioned
whether we can build up. Mr. Maryak said yes however he doesn’t recommend it
due to the economics of the construction scale as the dollars per square foot
will increase. Mr. Maryak added that this building does not include a basement
due to the high water table. Ms. Wilcox asked the estimate per square foot.
Mr. Maryak said it would be the $750 range. Mr. Troy inquired about the road
test area. Ms. Larkin said they will be able to move to
Chairman
Daniels asked that Mr. Maryak address the Moose property and Office of the
Aging. Mr. Maryak presented map review of that property and said that he and
Ms. Deloff have met to hammer out the agency needs. The agency needs a minimum
of 17,500 square feet meaning that a one story building will not work. He said
we maximize the footprint of
Mr.
Tagliente stated that the summary for space projections for 2008 is 14,000
square feet; for 2013 is 14,000 square feet and we are considering a 22,000
square foot building. He suggested saving about a million dollars and put the
Elections Office there. Mr. Maryak said that is possible and you also have a
basement in this building for storage. Mr. Hartnett said that the entrance off
Ms.
Price thanked the Chairman for having the meeting requested by the Minority
and Majority Leaders to discuss the issues with the whole legislature.
Mr. Daniels presented a letter from Chad Loomis, Chairman of Buildings
& Grounds.
RECEIVE AND FILE
The following documents were received and filed:
·
Letter dated
·
Letter to legislators dated
·
Letter to legislators dated
Chairman Daniels said that there
have been some legislators advocating the sale of the Moose property so he
directed a resolution to be prepared to dispose of the issue one way or
another. Today we need to resolve that issue and Mr.
Daniels entertained a motion for
item number 1. Ms. Price raised a point of order referring to page 21 of the
Cortland County Rules of Order that resolutions shall be available 48 hours
before a Special Meeting. She said these were not available until this morning
just prior to session. Mr. Daniels said he would entertain a motion to suspend
the rules. For lack of a motion and a second, the
rules were not suspended to allow consideration of the resolutions.
Motion was made by Ms. Wilcox, second by Mr. Hartnett to pull Agenda Nos. 1-6 as follows:
With all members voting aye, Agenda Nos. 1-6 were pulled.
Mr. Cornell said he was not
comfortable voting on this without all the information. Mr. Daniels said then
we are having a meeting for no reason. Ms. Tytler said she had spoken to
Mr. Williams stated there is a
step prior to this that he has previously advocated and that is the
development of a Master Plan. He said we are discussing only two end pieces.
Mr. Daniels agreed stating that we have had 14 studies done and what he have
tried to do with the COB study is put everything together. He questioned how
that can be done as long as we continue to procrastinate. He stated that he
has allowed all committee chairmen to run their committees now for five months
and it is time to move forward and get something accomplished.. Mr. Williams
pointed out that these resolutions are end game solutions without defining
what the game is. It lacks the framework of a master plan. Mr. Tagliente
agreed that we have made decisions on DMV and the Office of the Aging but didn’t
think we are ready to make the proposed decisions. Mr. Waldbauer agreed that
this has gone on long enough however we have just received the information. He
said that due to the magnitude of this that more time is needed to make the
final decisions. Ms. Wilcox said that they all want to move forward but it is
their responsibility to the public to be better informed for our decisions and
we haven’t had that opportunity. Ms. Tytler said she agreed with the
Chairman in terms of moving forward however we are considering selling
property without thoroughly evaluating that property for our identified needs.
She said that she also agreed with Mr. Williams and had hoped that a proposed
summit would give us all a sense of direction and that didn’t happen. She
further stated that she had come prepared to vote for the larger version of
the DMV proposal until Mr. Tagliente suggested co locating Election at the
Mr. Daniels said the reason he
brought the issues to the floor was because there were legislators at the last
Buildings and Grounds meeting that advocated selling the
Ms. Tytler said she did not
understand why it is necessary to decide to sell the property at this time.
Mr. Daniels said he wanted it on the record who votes to sell or not. Mr.
Williams said he was identified through the newspaper as one of the people who
want to sell and that is totally inaccurate. He said we need to decide whether
we need the property first and not just build on it because we acquired the
property. He hesitated to speak for Mr. Willcox however he believes that he
indicated that if we are not going to go with the property then we need to
sell it and move on. He further stated that to characterize either one of us
advocating that we just want to sell it is blatantly wrong. Mr. Troy referred
to the resolution statement that the legislature has determined that this
public building is no longer necessary for public use is premature to
consider at next Thursday’s meeting as we are not even close to making that
decision. Mr. Williams said we have already authorized the move of DMV and
purchased the land. What should be discussed next week is whether we need
4,000 square feet or the larger proposals.
Chairman Daniels asked Mr. Maryak to give an overview of the COB results. Mr. Maryak said they evaluated all current departments in this building as well as Mental Health and Horizon House. He projected staff growth for all departments as minimal; 5%. Excluding Office of the Aging and Buildings and Grounds department it appears that there is adequate space, however efficiency and work space can be improved, i.e Cooperative Extension, Public Health and Conflict Attorney. There are some projections for growth in the Public Defender (the most cramped) and Conflict Attorney departments that indicate providing shared space to save money. Further, the HAVA requirements for voting machines require an additional 16,030 square feet. He said that Public Health is the biggest challenge to redesign as the clinic space is inadequate, location is not functional and privacy issues are a major concern. He further stated that Mental Health space is inadequate in an undersized off-site facility that presently has 6,600 square feet and needs 8,845 square feet. Horizon House off-site facility is inadequate due to parking and that the structure does not lend itself to functions and needs an additional 3 to 400 square feet to insure better functionality. They would prefer to stay off-site due to their program needs. Co locating Public Health, Mental Health and Horizon House to share clinic, interview and conference space provides good reason to save money on staffing, space issues and better access for the public. Social Services has adequate office space however the reception and waiting areas are undersized and present security issues. Even though this department is growing, their need for excess space has been alleviated by automation of paper files previously required for storage. He advised that the County needs to look at similar storage issues in other departments, especially at the Courthouse to relieve space used for storage. The Veterans Office has security and file storage issues also. He concluded saying that all information supporting these conclusions will be provided in a report next week.
Mr. Williams requested that the
Meeting adjourned at
Minutes prepared by Susan
Morgan, Clerk of the Legislature