Mar. 13—Taxpayers approved the bond for construction of Fire Station No. 2 in 2022, and this month Councilors awarded the second contract for work to move forward on the project totaling $4.2 million, but with projections for completed construction to have a $1 million budget shortfall.
Admittedly by all those involved in the discussion about how to close the gap for the estimated almost $9 million total project — City Councilors, City Staff on the project, City Engineers, Firefighter personnel, architects and the leadership of the selected construction company — find no easy solution.
Lest taxpayers think this is coming out of their pockets at this time, they should not be worried, said Cory Williams, former Oklahoma House Representative (D-34), attorney and Stillwater business owner.
"I'm of the ilk if you want to advance, you have to invest in yourself," he said.
"But we haven't had a sales tax jump in awhile, and we haven't had ones related to this project."
"I'm glad to see us investing in infrastructure — our roads definitely need it, our water infrastructure needs it," Williams said.
"At some point you have to pay for those things, and every year they go up. I very much do appreciate improved infrastructure and access to infrastructure. I think people generally want to live in places that are well-cared for."
Engineering Director for the City of Stillwater Candy Staring told City Council the money difference — which she explained at the same time as the ask for the award for work package two — has to do with the economy, record inflation since the time the bond was voted in, supply chain challenges and the restrictions of the bond language, along with the time frame required to do work within bond restrictions.
The elephant in the room was how to make up for the inevitable cash shortfall — would it be cuts, choosing trades, selecting cheaper work or materials or finding the money?
"When we look at some of these numbers we're not even certain we can get that much savings," she said. "Trying to get the bond language to match the budget has been nearly impossible and (when) we look at some of these numbers we're wondering how we can do that ... but, quite frankly we have to have some more money to fill this gap that we're facing with this project."
Staring's presentation, along with David Robinson, architect, Stillwater Fire Chief Terry Essary and Aaron Stoops of Crossland Construction, revealed a complicated process, yet delivered a simple message regarding the financial shortfall.
That message is that if time wasn't a consideration, everyone could go back to the drawing board, revise designs, rebid the contract and start again, said Stoops, whose company has constructed 55 fire stations, and is also the company hired for this public works project.
"Unfortunately time is not on our side," he said. "We have bond language we have to comply with so that's what we're working toward — it's that delicate balance of the funding and the schedule we have to adhere to."
"Like Candy mentioned, it is beyond what any of us could have conceived what inflation has done to the market in conjunction with that we are competing with," Stoops said.
"There are a ton of huge projects going — everyone in municipalities across the state are building so goods, subcontractors ... we have tried to bring everything we can to this project — bids have come in far more than we could have imagined," Stoops said.
By law according to the bond, Staring said, timelines can't be missed.
Essary told Councilors that when the project began, comparable estimated square footage costs for similar design-builds for fire stations started a little more than $300 a square foot and he has watched prices consistently rise to now $600 a square foot.
He said Edmond recently received an estimate for a fire house and it's closer to $700 a square foot.
"What we all have to keep in mind is the mission of this fire station," Staring said. "The building has to be a functional fire station that protects the health and safety of our public — the appealing look, the architectural elements and the wants have to take second place to that mission."
But not all agreed. Some of the architectural, design and build elements must also take into consideration quality of work; health, wellness and mental resets for first responders; longevity of the building and the proper storage to house and maintain life- and property-saving equipment.
"Advocating for the fire department I absolutely want the front entry and I want all the nice stuff, but it's not 100% necessary," Essary said.
"But if there's anything we can do to hold on to some things that gives us some character and really sets us up for the next 50 to 100 years I would greatly appreciate it."
At the end of the presentations, Deputy City Manager Brady Moore said the great challenge is not to make excuses because of inflation costs and the square footage that needs to be met (15,000).
He said there are essential items, such as the deep foundation (on piers that go deep into bedrock versus spread footing with superficial piers and reinforced steel — a possible $60,000 savings to go with spread footing) that are a necessity.
"We're trying to design this fire station to be 100% functional to serve the safety of the community and be something to last 100 years — and be something the community is proud of," he said.
"We're committed to the process. We know there's going to be a funding gap, so we're looking at where to prioritize funds that we have."
We have rural fire funds, and some of the rural equipment is going to be housed in the new fire station, so there are some eligible funds there we have some funds set aside for, he said. There is also the possibility to allocate funds set aside from capital funds.
"We've been working and working trying to solve this," Staring said. "It's trying to meet the very specific bond language that we can't vary from, and we can't not meet the schedule with this bond.
"So those two things are non-negotiable, and we can't stop. We have to move forward, so we really have to work together here to either find funding or find cuts, or whatever we need to do to make this keep this moving and that's why we're here tonight to find out about the award of these contracts."
"The rest of it is, if you guys (City Councilors) need us to look for more funding, we can come back to look for that information. If you want to tell us, 'Do not exceed more than 7.9 million dollars for construction that we have now,' we will come back to you and tell you what that a one million dollar less fire station will look like," Staring said.
"There's always a path," Stoops said.
"We're committed to the project tonight and we're awarding the critical components that we need to award," Moore said.
Councilors then motioned and approved the award to Crossland Construction of contracts for the work package two, the second tranche of three, for a total of $4,243,162.
The construction of a new Fire Station No. 2 is part of the City of Stillwater's T.I.M.E. initiative — Together Investing in Municipal Excellence: city projects meant to identify community needs to improve the quality of life in Stillwater. For more information, please see www.stillwaterok.gov and T.I.M.E. Projects.
