Public Safety Building Committee

TOWN OF PRINCETON

BOARD/COMMITTEE: Public Safety Building Committee MINUTES

DATE: JANUARY 25, 2024                                     TIME: 6:30 PM              LOCATION: Town Hall Annex

Note: this public meeting was conducted in person at the Annex, with a remote teleconferencing option available for public participation. Public participation details were posted with the agenda.

Members in attendance: Karen Cruise, Brian Keevan, Claire Golding, Carl Soderberg, Daeg Brenner

Members in attendance remotely:

Others in attendance:

Others in attendance remotely: Paul Patriarca, John Bennett, Mike Cote

Votes taken in the following actions are “all in favor unless” noted otherwise.

After unsuccessfully dealing with some technical projector issues, Karen called the meeting to order at 6:46 PM.

6:47 Review and approved minutes from the 1/11 meeting as amended.

External design review will be scheduled with police chief when Sherry gets back.

Wetlands discussion.  Site plan and environmental plan from Berkshire Hathaway.  Brian did not have any issues with wetlands shown on plan.  Ian had made some comments about location of the stormwater and regulatory issues.  Site plan does not include water tank location, Carl suspects this will need to be located outside the building and will be quite large.  Tank is required to contain sufficient fire suppression water for the building because there is no pressure line from a public source and a well would not supply enough water for fire suppression.  Brian reviewed some wetlands regulation language regarding prohibitions on stormwater discharge in Zone 1 and Zone A but there are limited standards for redevelopment projects.  Carl explained that there will be a tight tank for water used for washing and decontamination on site, but there is no design yet only a floor plan.  Brian will follow up with other regulatory experts for help.

Carl reviewed some of the cost savings ideas considered already for this project:  insulated concrete forms (ICF), prefab construction, modular options, and post/beam option.  There was some hope that labor costs could be reduced by not having to pay prevailing wage for the offsite construction elements.  Chief Bennett had made a contact in Maine to investigate modular options, and the option was reviewed by C&B who factored in missing elements and ultimately found no significant difference in the cost over just building it on site.  Carl explained also how total project costs (design, contingency planning, site prep, building demolition, furniture and fixtures) especially in Massachusetts are much higher than construction cost alone.  The committee did look into other examples brought up by residents citing much lower price tags and concluded that those examples only factored in construction costs, and that our total building costs for this project are in fact in line with all these other projects.

Carl reviewed the design changes that were changed from Option A (presented at Town Meeting in 2020, at just over 15,000 sq.ft. and just around $12M) to Option D based on work of the committee in past years.  Every element was scrutinized and there was not a lot to trim although the fitness center and bunk room were removed.  At this point the building cannot be trimmed further and still meet the needs of the town.  The EOC room will be the only open space and it will be doing extra duty as a ready room for emergency operations as well as serve as a meeting and training space.  Major change from option A to D is reduction of shared and hallway space between the two departments.  The committee worked with the building department to look at building the mezzanine area to a code level that would allow for later retrofitting with fitness equipment for department personnel only.  Karen said Paul has expressed that the police will need more space. 

There are code issues with developing the second floor area for storage over the business space on the first floor.  ADA – discussion of whether an elevator was needed, whether all staff needed access to the second floor which would not be public space, whether a chair lift for one person at a time would suffice. There needs to be room on the floor plan for a lift.

There were questions about the need for a detective’s office on the police side when the town didn’t have a detective, but it was pointed out that there was still a need for another closed space for sensitive conversations or occasional use so the space was left in the design and renamed.

Extras on exterior design (false ‘suburban’ dormers, other embellishments) were eliminated to cut costs, but there is still some potential to improve second floor utility with some creative design.  Extending the trussed roof line over the equipment bays all the way across the building will add flexibility.  Heating and insulation costs to be considered if that space over the bays was to be utilized.

Carl explained that reduced the gross footprint of the building by 2,600 square feet and we’ve pared down all the fat at this point, saving some money which has since been outpaced by the increase in construction costs which are now $1 million higher.  This will likely be even more by the time this comes up at Town Meeting.

Architect has provided a list of items to consider with costs attached, mostly small ticket items that wouldn’t add up to substantial cost savings.  CMU item was the most significant but opting for a cheaper alternative would sacrifice durability in the vehicle bays.  Chief Bennett has responded to that list already.

Carl described the flow of the building design for the new committee members.  Extended discussion about current design.  Cost issues include dealing with ledge, Center School demolition, PFAS water treatment for the building.  There have been conversations about extending water lines from the town hall complex.  The committee had considered other parcels in order to reduce costs associated with demo of the school, but the one they looked into most closely was the parcel across Boylston Avenue with the fire pond and determined it was not viable for the needs of the building.  Krashes field, Dingman Park, PMLD were dismissed.

The open field behind the site is highly valued by the neighbors and a point of contention.  Carl is concerned about the need to locate the water tank somewhere on site and how that might impact the field.  Karen mentioned that Chief Bennett liked the idea of being able to land a helicopter in that field because of issues with drivers cutting through the helipad at Station 2.  The chief added that landing one on the common has other issues with traffic there, and that it would be great if State Police Airwing could land in a less visible space like the field behind the school.  He also described the poor quality of the field itself for a sports area, which was also mentioned by Daeg.  Regarding the second floor, the chief mentioned that in Sterling the upper floor was designated as ‘firefighter space’, and those personnel must meet certain agility requirements, so his idea is not to take away the gym area he has grant money for but use the second floor for bunks, offices, and med storage.  Access to this could be into the admin space as well as directly down to the apparatus bay.  Fire poles are still allowed.  Carl likes the idea of having the second floor space usable on day one, and is interested in the way they worked with code to make that work.

Option D is the standing option at this point, and we need to go through the exercise with the architect to consider costs for designing that second floor space.

Claire asked about considering energy efficient options that will reduce costs over the long term.  Carl suggested that we will need to meet the MA Stretch energy code and that will help a lot with meeting energy efficiency and keeping costs down. Clair pointed out that fossil fuel heating was still allowed under Stretch energy and suggested instead that heat pumps should be considered for room heat and water heating.  Carl said C&B can design for those ideas but we should put it specifically in the scope.  Chief Bennet said both Sterling and Holden installed thermal heating in the concrete floors of the truck bay which saves a lot of money. 

Daeg asked if there was a timeline for getting this before ATM.  Karen thought it would take a year or so for final design.  We have money now to pay for construction plan development but might need to go more than once for more funds.

Paul thinks the design should call for separate locker areas by department; responsibility for shared space needs to be determined; access to firearms in shared locker rooms; unisex locker areas rather than men/women with individual private changing rooms; room for growth; thinks empty lobby for public entry not very inviting especially at late hours (Carl mentioned that the entrance way went through several iterations); would like to discuss at next meeting.  He respects all the work the committee went through to get this far but wants to make sure that we don’t move forward with a design that we regret later.  Karen asked Paul to offer any ideas or pictures/plans.  Karen is concerned that separating shared space would not go over well with the town.

Karen stated that by next time we will have heard from Sherry about getting a contract set up with C&B.

Adjourned at 8:04 p.m.

Respectfully submitted, Brian Keevan