CHESHIRE, Mass. — Town officials are exploring steps to bring forward a public safety building project that could include fire, police and ambulance situated on the parking lot at the Community House.

 

The current fire station is a former auto service garage built in the 1930s and renovated for the Fire Department in 1986. The Police Department is still in the small annex at the old Town Hall and there's consideration of staging an ambulance in town. 

 

"We kind of want to plan this so 25 years down the road, we're still in pretty good shape," said Fire Chief Thomas Francesconi. "So we're not busting at the seams. So again, the magic crystal ball doesn't always work, but we're at least going to try our best to make sure that it's sustainable."

 

The Board of Selectmen and the ad hoc Public Safety Complex Committee met with procurement consultant Andrea Woods of Springfield on Wednesday night. 

 

Woods, joining remotely, laid out some of the basic steps the could consider — hiring an owner's project manager, doing a space needs analysis or feasibility study, determining a modular or custom build, looking at energy efficiency, planning how to secure funds and ensuring the site it picks is suitable and surveyed. 

 

She offered a number OPMs she's worked with over the years and who have done public safety buildings. She suggested that the town invite them to bid in addition to a public posting for a request for proposals. 

 

"What I would do for you would be to listen to what you have to say tonight of where you are," Woods said. "I could take your space needs analysis, kind of plug it into a template document for the request for OPM services, which you folks would fine tune to make sure that all of your most important topics are covered."

 

She estimated she could put together an RFP in about a week and recommended posting it for three — longer if they wanted to include a site visit. 

 

A committee would rank the proposals and from there the town and she would help negotiate a fee. It would likely be about 3 percent of the cost of the project while a designer fee runs 8 to 10 percent.

 

"They're going to send you basically a team of five or six people of who they think are the are the best types of people to work with them," Woods said. 

 

Town Administrator Jennifer Morse acknowledged that she had received some past contracts from Woods that show the scope of services available.

 

Woods also advised contacting towns with recent building projects but the town is already ahead in that regard. 

 

Francesconi said the complex committee is looking at new Williamsburg public safety complex as a model. The $5.3 million, 8,000-square-foot joint fire and police station opened in fall 2023. 

 

The chief said the figure they are looking at is about $4.5 million, on par with the cost to Williamsburg, which also received $1.8 million in state grants for energy efficiency.

 

Selectwoman Michelle Francesconi asked if a feasibility or survey would have to be done. Woods said the committee could do one or do a simple bullet list of needs and work with an OPM with experience in public safety.

 

"What do you want to get to at the end, but not the weeds of the details to get there," she said. "They do live in those weeds. And, you know, they can tell you all of that."

 

The fire chief said he couldn't speak for the police but his department has a punch list but not details in terms of sizes. Plus, he noted, any building would conform to National Fire Protection Association.

 

"We're volunteer now, but we have to plan a little bit for the future, too, because EMS is a big factor around here that we're struggling with, as is the nation," Francesconi said. "But I think we're going to have to build into this one something with a full-time EMS, whether it be from the town or outside of the town."

 

Selectmen Shawn McGrath said he would like to have some figures in time for the annual town meeting. 

 

The board also voted on a 20-year lifespan for the new firetruck authorized by town meeting at a cost of $850,000. Francesconi said the 20 years is standard.