The decision to create a permanent home for Park Hills City Council was tabled at Monday’s meeting in order to gather input from the community and go over the cost.
Right now, the city doesn’t have an official council meeting space, and members need to set up and tear down meeting spaces each time they convene. For the most recent bridge project presentation, Mayor Kathy Zembrodt said, they had to prop a display up on tables covered in sheets.
At Monday’s meeting, held at the Gardens of Park Hills, a motion was put forth to authorize and direct Zembrodt to sign and execute a real estate purchase agreement with Global Technology Transfer, LLC to acquire 1502 Dixie Highway in Park Hills, which would become the city’s new meeting space.
Ultimately, city council members voted instead to table the vote until a further finance committee meeting and then a city caucus meeting can be held later this month and into February.
The options for a permanent home are for the city to buy land and build a new structure, which would cost upward of $1 million, or to develop a building on Amsterdam Road. But to bring that building up to the necessary codes, that could cost $1 million as well.
“Conceptually, I love this idea,” councilmember Pamela Spoor said at the meeting on Monday. “I think we need a permanent venue for our council meetings. And most importantly, what I really like is that it’s in the center of the city, on the highway.”
Spoor said she liked the size and price of the Dixie Highway location, which, around $300,000, seemed reasonable for a city of Park Hills’ size. She said she is not willing to spend much more for such a project.
Zembrodt recently spoke to Global Technologies about the space for sale on Dixie, which has potential parking with usage of neighboring businesses lots after their operating hours. In December, she was offered a contract. The space would hold about 70 people in the current half that is available, and more once the other rented space frees up. Council discussed an idea of offering to buy half of the parking lot of the Szechuan restaurant, which could fit up to 50 cars.
Taking out a few walls and fixing bearings, as well as cosmetic touches, goes into configuring the cost of the project. These add up to roughly $15,000-20,000. They would have to honor the current lease with Edward Jones, which would temporarily give the city an income of about $1,000 a month.
Monday’s vote specifically was on granting Zembrodt the authority to sign a contract, though that does not make the contract binding. There are contingencies built into it that allows council to pull out, such as financial and viewing contingencies.
According to Zembrodt, signing the document only makes it so that viewing the building becomes possible. Council members were given a copy of the contract and an option to not vote on it at the meeting. But if they didn’t vote on it, members were optioned to have the finance committee discuss the funding of the purchase and then hold a caucus meeting before February. The contract details would allow for council to pull the rug from the project if they do decide to allow Zembrodt authority.
Council member Sarah Froelich said she wants to hold a caucus meeting to gather input from city members to discuss the purchase before any major undertakings happen on the matter.
Zembrodt agreed and said she wants a finance committee meeting to take place so that a full picture of affordability by the city can be presented to the public for the caucus meeting.
The city has not yet finalized dates for the finance and caucus meetings.
