GREENFIELD — Plans for a proposed public safety complex downtown will finally be discussed with residents next week.
Mayor William Martin will hold a public meeting Wednesday, July 25, to discuss the proposed construction of a public safety complex on Main and Wells streets. The complex, if built, would house the police and fire departments, including dispatch, as well as the Greenfield Community, Energy and Technology (GCET), Martin said.
The meeting will be held at the John Zon Community Center starting at 6 p.m.
Martin said city officials including himself, Finance Director Elizabeth Braccia, Fire Chief Robert Strahan and Police Chief Robert Haigh will be at the meeting to discuss the plans.
“We’ll want to explain why we started this and how we’re moving along,” Martin said.
The complex has been years in development for the city and is one of the linchpins in Greenfield getting a new library. The plans for the new library include building where the Greenfield Fire Department has its station on Main Street.
Martin said the city is negotiating the “language and numbers of a lease” for the complex with the owner of 106-114 Main St. and 22-36 Wells St., Dyer Investments, which is where it would be built. The negotiations includes cost and length of the lease. Martin said a 25- to 30-year lease could be expected. He also said a lease of $800,000 a year would be “ideal.”
Due to the potential length of the lease, Martin said City Council must approve it. Martin can only approve contracts with the city that are up to three years long, he said.
If approved, Martin said the complex is expected to be two stories tall, about 50,000 square feet and on 1.68 acres of land. The Police Department is expected to be on Main Street and the fire department on Wells Street. The building will wrap around Whitney Hill Antiques at 102 Main St.
The design within the building is yet to be determined, Martin said, but will be done by its owners with city input. He said the buildings currently there will have to be demolished and new ones would be constructed.
If approved, Martin said it could be “12 to 15 months” before the departments would be able to move.
If the Police Department moves to the location, Martin believes the city could sell the department’s building on High Street close to its assessed value of just over $1 million and would receive tax revenue once they find a new owner. Martin also said by selling the property, it could return to the tax rolls.
One of the moving parts to the entire plan is timing.
In receiving a $9.38 million grant from the Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners to help pay for a portion of its new construction, the library has a deadline of six months to get the grant approved by City Council, then a year and a half to start construction of the new building or they lose the grant, though extensions can be given.
Overall, the envisioned new library has been estimated to cost around $20.5 million, with taxpayers picking up about $6 million.
And right now, there is no price tag for the town and the safety complex.
Martin said the complex could also attract the state to operate its regional dispatching, including Greenfield, out of it but that cannot happen until the complex is constructed.
Haigh said regionalization of dispatch, which would include the police and fire departments of the county and state police in the area, is being discussed by state and city officials.
“At this point, nothing is in stone that this is happening but we are working towards it,” Haigh said.
According to Haigh, an independent study was performed to determine the feasibility of regional dispatch out of Greenfield, which came back with positive recommendations.
With a regionalization plan, though, Haigh said several criteria would need to be met, including building size and location, issues that could be addressed by the new complex.
If the state were to operate a regionalized dispatch center, Martin said the city’s dispatching of police and fire could be absorbed by the state. He claimed that this move could save Greenfield about $823,000 — the cost in the city’s budget for dispatch, including benefits.