Police Station Committee

Police Station Project Review Committee Meeting Minutes Thursday, August 8, 2013 5:00 pm, Norwich City Hall, Room 319 Agenda Items/Notes/Discussion Action Items 1. Call to order-Chair Chairman David Eggleston called the meeting to order at 5:02 p.m. 2. Members Present/Absent-Verification of Quorum Committee Members Present: Chairman David Eggleston, Vice-Chair Karen Neeley, Scott Camassar, Susan Fiegel, Andrew Harvey, Dennis Jenkins (left at 6:52 pm), Larry Kendall (left 6:38 p.m.), William Kenny, Robin Lawson, Keith Ripley, Derell Wilson (arrived at 5:06 pm), and Dave Winkler. Quorum: Yes, 12 members. Quorum of 10 closed the meeting. Committee Members Absent: Martin Shapiro Support Staff Present Christine Averna (Recording Secretary) 3. Adoption of Minutes: July 25, 2013 D. Eggleston to distribute Copies of the July 25, 2013 meeting minutes were distributed. Motion to adopt D. Jenkins, via email another copy of second S. Camassar. A. Harvey asked about the handout Motion carried unanimously with the updated Space Needs D. Winkler, S. Fiegel, K. Ripley, and A. Harvey abstaining. (Action Item generated) Assessment comparison he distributed at the 7/25/13 meeting. Because two committee members and a member of the press in attendance indicated they had to leave early, D. Eggleston moved directly to Item #5 on the agenda. Due to the length of the presentation for Item #5, and the questions by committee members, there was no time at the end of the meeting to address the open action items (item #4 on the on the agenda). Therefore all items were carried over to next agenda for August 22nd. 4. Open Action Items: Carried to Next Meeting a) Verify with Corporation Counsel what information can and cannot be copied for distribution to the committee. (7/11/13 meeting) b) Review Space Needs Update and Firing Range Info and formulate follow-up questions; pairs with agenda. (7/11/2013 meeting)(Future Agenda Item) c) Research existence of additional ideas to modify the current police station site. (7/11/13 meeting) d) Confirm with City Council what type of report they expect in September and if a presentation is required, how much time is allotted. (7/11/13 meeting) e) Review Plan of Conservation and Development (POCD) on the city website (7/25/13 meeting) f) Review and the proposed Committee Project Plan for edits/additions. (7/25/13 meeting) 5. Guest Panel: Bob Mills (NCDC) and Marge Blizard (RDA) D. Eggleston indicated that we have all been talking about what is the vision for Norwich and the question is “what should the police station be”. We have a view. Our visitors are here to give another view. Bob Mills (NCDC), Jason Vincent (NCDC), and Marge Blizard (RDA) introduced themselves to the committee. Bob Mills indicated that the NCDC now also works with utilizing current assets. The idea is to create a demand in the community to draw people in. They are also here to help improve the messaging to the community. He further indicated that Norwich is heavily mixed urban, suburban, and rural environments, a Page 1 of 8  Police Station Project Review Committee Meeting Minutes developed community-done being developed. Current strategy is redevelopment of existing space. The cost of developing in Norwich is generally higher due to hills, ledges, rock, and flooding and wetlands. The other aspect of old industrial development is that most of it is by waterways, rivers. J. Vincent gave map/plan presentations. He went over the following maps from the Plan of Conservation and Development (POCD) Document; available on the city website under the Planning Department: • Planning Areas • Community Structure • Residential Densities • Road and Transit • Economic Development • Utility Infrastructure He indicated that about 16% of the community is undeveloped, meaning nothing is on those areas (electric, gas, water, etc,) D. Wilson asked what the blue areas on the maps represent. J. Vincent replies that the dark blue is water service delivery areas. K. Ripley asks if the map included gas. J. Vincent replies that it does not, items are still being added. S. Camassar believes the maps suggest a preferred location of downtown or Taftville close to downtown and asks if that is a correct assumption. B. Mills indicated that downtown makes sense for many reasons. It has the most investment for the City, the most potential for new investment, the most potential for new housing and new growth, and it is where most issues occur. It’s a location from which you can get to where you need to be quickly. And it is attractive to economic development. We especially like this community policing where there’s a very visible and very friendly feeling. They’re on bicycles and their feet in the community. A. Harvey asks if they have crime statistics. B. Mills replies no. J. Vincent indicated that they can get them but he believes it’s more perception issues than crime issues. M. Blizard indicated that police services are needed where the people are. B. Mills indicated that transit times and visibility are also key. D. Winkler notes that all the suggested circles are on corridors and populations. J. Vincent indicated that they shouldn’t be placed in rural or residential areas. K. Neeley asks what would happen if it was put in a residential area. J. Vincent replies that it would be a very busy place 24/7/365. A community police station has shift changes, night meetings and events, a community center, and a training center, lots of traffic, and very disruptive to residents. M. Blizard adds that property values would go down. Also, the police need a main road. D. Jenkins agrees it needs to be central so they can get anywhere in the city in three minutes and no more than five minutes. D. Wilson asks if view lines created by building up in downtown would affect sales. M. Blizard replies that there are already several high buildings in downtown. J. Vincent adds that view is not an issue. There is a seven story footprint in Norwich so there is no view expectation. R. Lawson inquired to all three guests, based on your credential and knowledge and wherever the studies came from as far as growth and population numbers that drove the Page 2 of 8  Police Station Project Review Committee Meeting Minutes space needs assessment of the police department, do they agree with that? Do they actually believe that that is going to happen? Even in this economy is our population going to grow? B. Mills mentions that over time things change. Economic development currently thinks that fuel prices will rise to about $10 a gallon in the next ten years. We are not going to be able to support all these massive suburban developments. Part of what we’re working on is the strategy that places like downtown Norwich will become more of the go-to places to be. Now is the time to work on a strategy that makes downtown the place to be by putting everything within walking distance and close to public transportation. They will want a place they can go and stay. Where they can park and get around town – fun, shop, eat. K. Neeley asks did we or did we not just establish as a committee that the number of people isn’t necessarily the driver as is the composition of the community and the nature of policing and the nature of crime and the nature of the way the community is? Did we have a discussion about if 45,000 predicted population is actually 40,000 does that change the number of police officers that we need or is it the type of police officers? So population isn’t the driver, right? And how are the casino changes going to impact Norwich. J. Vincent replies that they are working with the CT Data Center Numbers which are way off for the suburbs but it was pretty close for Norwich. What’s driving population in our urban areas is birth rates for one, and migration is another is we built over 1,000 housing units over the last decade when nobody else in the region did anything like that so new people came. Not only that but the types of people that came had different family formations than the family units of the suburbs. Hispanics and blacks have the highest birth rate in Connecticut so places that have high percentages of those populations are going to grow in the future. Connecticut is becoming a very high percentage Hispanic state. Those are what the demographics show when you look at it. Whites and Asians have the lowest birth rates. Norwich is going to see additional growth on that side because of those factors but the factors that B. Mill’s is talking about single person households is going to represent 33% of our household populations in the next decade. It was in the 9% range in the 1900’s. A single person household can find housing in Norwich. A single person doesn’t want to live in a 4,000 square foot house. We have housing stock for singles and empty-nesters looking to downsize. Norwich is very attractive and less expensive to live in than our competition. K. Neeley asks if NPU is an attractor. M. Blizard indicated that those who here like it but it is not an attractant in the residential market. J. Vincent mentions that in the next 100 years, there will be many communities under water a significant portion of the time but Norwich will not be one of them. An example is Miami which is under water after a major storm event so there are going to be 3 – 5,000,000 people displaced. As a country there is going to be a migration and places like Norwich are going to be ready. B. Mills indicated he has been here five years and that there hasn’t been a seed change in the economic growth but a few key trends have been seen in his time here. There has been a huge boom in health care facilities popping up, three are coming on line or will be coming on line in the next year. They’re primarily happening on the corridors that were on those maps we saw earlier. Also, in the City of Norwich, we have developed over time and many administrations a whole network of issues and problems and knots in the ability to get things done. Development is critical to untie one knot at a time. The kind of thing that happens in development in urban areas is we treat them like suburban areas. For instance, the rules that apply to suburban parking lot requirements for Dr. offices and in retail are different and Page 3 of 8  Police Station Project Review Committee Meeting Minutes we apply those same standards to downtown so what we ended up doing was looking at the oldest building on the block and said let’s tear this down and put in a parking lot and then we promised all that parking to one building. Our community is riddled with areas that don’t produce any income or real value for the community and yet we have them all over and when the building occupancy goes down the lot is vacant. And then the building next door doesn’t take a space because there’s no parking available because of these designated spots for empty buildings. It makes these heavily populated beautiful environments like Norwich very difficult places to get things done. D. Winkler indicated he was downtown and parked in SNET parking and they share their parking with Spirit of Broadway. He recently visited Grand Junction Colorado and he found a main road with parking all behind it. There’s a map on the City Street and it says that by Ordinance all parking in the City proper was open and free to all guests after 5 pm. It is a wonderful ordinance. You can park real close to just about anything and he was at a festival downtown and in talking to a business owner and that he said the open parking was a huge thing in developing the downtown. Un hooking the parking in downtown would be great. It’s about the 5th street bond that was voted down, the one with a parking garage attached to it and he says that one of the things he heard a lot before the vote was that they believed it wouldn’t be long before all the parking was reserved for something. How do you stop that in new development? B. Mills replied that you have to address that first in zoning. You need not force a building to have that much parking. You also have to strong arm the leadership in the City to not designate the spots and make them open spots. They’ve fought three times in the last five years to not have the spots designated. J. Vincent adds that it can be built into the referendum that this parking lot will never be reserved for anything other than public use. M. Blizard indicated that when she shows office space they find out that they will have to pay for parking spaces for their employees on the next block and they go elsewhere to rent because of that inconvenience. B. Mills indicated that a key to uncorking development is these knots. We need to undo some messes that have paralyzed us for so long. We think there will be a lot of growth. K. Neeley asks if other similar communities are going through this too. J. Vincent replies that it is happening in other similar communities. B. Mills adds that a main difference is how we handle the problems. M. Blizard then shifted the discussion to brownfields which are prime industrial sites because they were right along the river; Chestnut Street, Ponemah Mills, Capehart Mill, Shipping Street, etc. It would be great to redevelop them the problem is that it takes a long time. Norwich has a very successful brownfield remediation in Occum Park. It was a textile mill and it burned down and it was a mess. You have to find out what the problem is through testing, then you remediate it but you have to know what you’re going to do with it before you remediate it since it has to be cleaner for a hospital than for a warehouse. So you have to do a lot of planning and write good proposals and apply for grants since we don’t have the money to do this. The EPA and State DEEP have the money. We have applied for grants for testing for the last two years but didn’t get them. We are reapplying this year. The grants are for testing in general but we would start with our priority sites. Privately owned properties pose a problem too. It has been tempting to do the quick fix when a business wants to come to the City they’ve been put on new land in the business park. For the committee’s purpose, if it picks one of these sites for the Police Station expect it to be a long process. It was seven years for Occum Park. It would be faster to remediate during demolition but it still is a long process. Page 4 of 8  Police Station Project Review Committee Meeting Minutes K. Neeley asks if that could be the driving force behind not looking at brownfields as ideal sites for the project put before the voters. A. Harvey mentions that it was one of the reasons Chestnut Street was discounted. M. Blizard mentions that the Chief wants something soon and not 10 or 15 years from now since they’ve outgrown their current place. D. Winkler asks what takes so long in the process. M. Blizard replies that Occum Park it was capped over. J. Vincent replies that it is funding too. If you don’t have funding that can add time and also what is the remediation process which is tailor-made by the EPA. There are remediation standards for various types of uses. Where we are with most of our testing is Phase I and Phase II is boring and testing. All that lab work and testing takes time. M. Blizard indicated that first you apply for grants for assessment for testing then you do your testing. Then you apply for another grant for remediation and then you apply for a grant to build the police station. A member of the public attending the meeting, Tucker Braddock, asked D. Eggleston if he could comment. He was allowed to comment and indicated that he believes that the Chestnut Street site owners said they would pay for the funding to build the police station. M. Blizard replies that even if they did you still have to assess and remediate the property. It may be clean but the process still has to be done. K. Neeley indicated she accessed the GIS maps on the city website and hazard mitigation of that area which shows the flood way but the whole building is not blue. Does that mean it is not entirely in the flood plain? M. Blizard indicated that a flood plain is when we get rain and the water level rises and the river runs out of its bank. The flood way is from Spaulding Pond and if the dam broke again that’s where the water would go. The water does go through part of the building and not the whole building. That would drive the cost up, though. If we have a natural disaster of some sort the police need to be able to get out of the police station whereas if there are homes there and they can’t get out it wouldn’t be as bad. S. Camassar asks with funding aside, how long does the testing, evaluation, and capping of all the hazards take?. M. Blizard indicated that if it’s a solid contamination that won’t leach into the water it could take about a year, funding aside. J. Vincent indicated that environmental land use restrictions, though difficult, can be removed. D. Winkler asks if the message here is because of the need to build a police station should the committee not consider brownfields? M. Blizard replies that if the need is that immediate then RDA and brownfield remediation may not work. Businesses are not ready to wait but if the City feels they can get by once we have a use and with the City backing it could be moved along faster. B. Mills indicated that you need to know what you’re dealing with since it may not take that long with a definite end use. If the funding is being pushed by the City it could change the nature of downtown. M. Blizard indicated that it is tough to get the grant. There has to be a goal, not just cleaning up a site. We need to remove blight, to increase public safety, maybe a community center and get businesses in. All of these would be compelling reasons to get the grant instead of other communities. D. Wilson asks who would apply for the grant. B. Mills replies that the City would – it works better when it’s a publically owned facility. K. Neeley asks if the City would have to acquire the property first? M. Blizard indicated that as Tucker Braddock said the owner has offered to put their own money in it but we don’t have the details of what the contamination is. D. Winkler indicates that time is an issue for the committee. It will go from the committee to the Council to bonding. That’s already at least 1 ½ years out. Page 5 of 8  Police Station Project Review Committee Meeting Minutes W. Kenney also knows there are points for grant applications for generating jobs, economic development, public safety. D. Winkler was in favor, with reps from NCDC and RDA in the room, of having the committee reach a consensus towards considering or not considering brownfields in case the Council is not happy with a brownfield option. A. Harvey understands it may cost more but there will probably be other benefits that outweigh the costs. D. Eggleston agrees that brownfields are not to be ruled out because of the added benefits of choosing a brownfield. The time may be longer but they should be okay until then. D. Winkler asks if everyone agrees that brownfield status of a site doesn’t eliminate our usage of a site. All committee members present at the meeting agreed. K. Ripley believes it’s too early to come up with a time frame. We have to continue plowing on at this. Also, he believes the GIS flood plain designation isn’t something written in stone. It is constantly changing. D. Winkler believes that it is possible to deal with the five years it might take to clean up a brownfield. A. Harvey wonders if time is something to consider. D. Eggleston thinks it’s too soon. Time can be short but it can be mitigated. We should understand the influence that time plays but it’s not a factor per se. A. Harvey agrees. We should have a solution before we try to mitigate time. D. Wilson asked for pros/cons/recommendation about building in a flood plain. B. Mills indicated that Social Security Office moved from their building at 101 Water Street (Thames Plaza) to the Mercantile Building because the first floor could flood. If you follow federal regulations it would not be a good site to use. J. Vincent agrees that they should stay away from potential flood areas since not all police apparatus will be out every day. In the event of a storm or disaster they don’t want to have to be worried about moving their equipment to safety instead of getting out and protecting the public. The flood plain is tidal based so plan accordingly. S. Camassar asks the guests if they have any information about the Chestnut Street brownfield. M. Blizard indicated the City owns one portion of the land that was tested. Private owner of the other piece of land doesn’t’ want testing done. From what we understand there are dyes, oils, inks, lead and asbestos. Probably can be tested and capped. The plan was to make parking. It will be tested and make sure the cap is sound. The plan was the parking would be for the other building. If it is used for a police station it would be the privately owned mill portion which is still in somewhat good shape. The owners are interested but it requires more that a conversation. It would not have to be as clean for a basketball court or recreation area since it’s open air. The jail cells would be considered 24 hour residence. D. Winkler asked if the NCDC is the right group to help the committee craft a message for the next police station proposal to the public? B. Mills indicated they were the only entity that kept the Intermodal Transportation Center going. They are happy to step in. For the Transportation center they were very involved in the communication to the communities. If it is in our control and we receive much information and work with the committee then they can fill that role. K. Neeley indicated that by statute the problem is with timing. Once the bond was on the referendum last year the city could no longer use public dollars to provide information to the public. W. Kenney believes we should make a point to include NCDC and RDA in the minutes and communications. They are vital resources and we need to include them in communications. K. Neeley indicates the best way for that to happen is for them and anyone else from the public to join the “Notify Me” section through the city website so they are informed every time the committee posts minutes. Page 6 of 8  Police Station Project Review Committee Meeting Minutes D. Eggleston indicated that what we need to tell the Council at the first meeting of September includes a short written report and then answer questions for a total of 20 minutes. He wants the committees backing before he does this. He wants to keep it generic – here’s what we’ve looked at and here’s what we’re going to look at and here are a couple of consensus opinions we’ve formed so far. He will bring them to the next meeting to discuss. For example, 1) we’ve looked at space needs and feel there are opportunities to D. Eggleston drafting make reductions and 2-We need to hire the NCDC to get some help. It probably requires report for the Council money if we ask them (NCDC) to do something outside their scope.(Action Item presentation for generated) committee review. K. Neeley referred to an email she sent the committee members after the last meeting that contained an analysis done by J. Vincent of the former Mr. Big’s site in Greeneville. She K. Neeley to email a copy further indicated the NCDC created a report for the Harbor Commission on the Boat Launch of the Boat Launch Site Site Project. (Action Item generated). They produced a report which had a map of Project document created potential sites they evaluated. Their SWOTS evaluation was so detailed that our committee by NCDC to the could benefit from having a similar report created classifying potential sites for the police committee members. station. We could produce a report with up to 30 sites in the City with rather comprehensive information. She further indicated she believed they are the talented ones that can provide one final report that will help move us along. J. Vincent has performed rating and scoring reports and can probably help us do the same. D. Wilson explains that that is how he feels about Thames Plaza and adjacent Market Street parking garage. J. Vincent was able to give a rating system of what, where, and why. D. Eggleston explains that we don’t want them to take over but we do want their help. W. Kenney believes we can help the Council define the scope of work for NCDC. They (NCDC) have asked the council to define a scope of work. The Council has NCDC writing a scope and if we can help them create more tasks it will serve their purposes and our purposes. The problem with the Police Station project was the police came out with “we need a new one” with no backup information. The scope of work hasn’t been defined so we can help them help us. K. Neeley indicated she spoke with City Manager Alan Bergren and what we need is a consensus of the committee and that we cannot move forward with site review without professional assistance. We would then give a copy of the site assessment report and copies of the email that shows examples of what can be done to the council for their consideration and ask them to either approve the funding or authorize the scope of what NCDC is doing or create an expenditure for the site assessment report once and for all. A. Harvey asks how is NCDC going to site assessment different than what has already been done? D. Eggleston indicated they would be taking the information and processing it for us. They are not usurping our role but they would be very helpful and give us professional assistance. D. Wilson agrees they are going to help us formulate a communication tool that is readable and everyone can understand it. D. Eggleston indicated we need some near term help. He is going to draft something for everyone to read and review. K. Ripley doesn’t believe the council should get another copy of the J. Vincent analysis of Mr. K Neeley will send a Big’s site document. But he does believe a thank you should be sent to the sender of the thank you email to Robert recommendation/request.(Action Item generated) Daniels for the potential site suggestion he K. Ripley indicated that he has started to compare the space needs for Norwich with the submitted to the city. space needs for West Haven. He suggests looking at the space needs for West Haven and Page 7 of 8  Police Station Project Review Committee Meeting Minutes compare it to ours. (Action Item generated) He did not find it encouraging. Certain items Committee members stand out. D. Winkler indicated he started to compare it too and wants to share it with the should review West committee as interesting information. He found it encouraging and helpful. D. Winkler feels Haven Space Needs that he wants to move forward with the committee visiting the West Haven station. After Assessment. reading the West Haven Space Needs Assessment Report, K. Ripley does not feel we need a visit. 6. New Business None. 7. Confirmation of Next Meeting Date Thursday, August 22, 2013, 5-7 pm, Room 319, Norwich City Hall 8. Adjournment Motion to adjourn, S. Camassar, 2nd S. Fiegel, meeting adjourned at 7:04 PM. Page 8 of 8