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Wednesday, October 31, 2007
By Jena Hardy
PULASKI —?A meeting between the Pulaski County School Board and the Pulaski
County Board of Supervisors resulted in the decision for the two boards to
co-locate and for the Board of Supervisors to purchase the Maple Shade Plaza in
downtown Pulaski.
At the two boards’ last joint meeting, the idea of moving the school board to
join the Board of Supervisors in the county administration building, after
moving social services out of that building and into the Maple Shade Plaza,
was discussed.
Members from both boards had questions and concerns about the conditions of the
space and the process of renovation and expansion in the county administration
building, so over this past month, they were given the opportunity to tour the
building and Glenn Reynolds, who has been researched this project, was
available to answer most of their questions.
Reynolds was present at last night’s meeting, in which he addressed all
questions by board members, which included concerns about security and safety,
quality and adequacy of the building in meeting the needs of both boards, the
possibility of expansion, management and maintenance, cost and the timeline for
the whole project.
Reynolds said that there are many parts of the building that are structurally
sound, but that there would still be some challenges with it. “We should look
at it as a blank sheet of paper,” he said.
Board of Supervisors Chairman Joe Sheffey asked what sort of time frame they
would be looking at for the whole process.
Reynolds said that they were looking at a time frame of 2 to 3 years, finishing
around Fall 2010.
School Board member Jeff Bain said that at this point, he still felt that there
were too many “ifs” and that he was not convinced that the building was
completely structurally sound and that the project would be able to be
completed at the cost that was proposed.
School Board Chairman Paul Phillips suggested the idea of consolidating similar
services by making the Maple Shade Plaza an administrative complex that would
house the school board, board of supervisors, treasurer and commissioner of
revenue, using the current county administration building as a human services
building that would include social services and the health department, and
using the courthouse for court services. Phillips said that he thought it this
might be a more efficient way to consolidate services to the public and to cut
down on redundant facilities.
Reynolds noted that this would just be an issue of “who goes where,” that it
would still require renovations to the county administration building but
wouldn’t really change any costs.
Board of Supervisors Vice-Chairman Frank Conner said he thought that Phillips’
idea made a lot of sense.
County Administrator Pete Huber said that more thought could be given to
configuration and who goes where, but the two main decision-making points that
night were whether or not the two boards should co-locate and if the Maple
Shade Plaza needed to be purchased.
Reynolds noted that it would basically cost the same however they decided to
configure things, but that the Maple Shade Plaza was definitely a good building
at a good price, that it would have adequate parking, that it was out of the
flood plain and the only real issue within the building would be sufficient
lighting.
Bain said that the observation he had made while working with other counties is
that Pulaski County is a somewhat difficult county to
work with, simply because of the fact that their services are spread out
instead of being in one convenient place. He used Carroll County
as an example, noting that all of their county services are in one location,
which is a “pure dream” for a citizen. He added that the Maple Shade Plaza
could be fixed up to be a very presentable location for county services.
Board of Supervisors member Eddie Hale asked whether or not they would
basically be starting all over again by going the route that Phillips had
suggested.
Reynolds said that they would not be completely starting over.
Board of Supervisors member Dean Pratt asked how costly it would be to create
more space for social services in the county administration building and
expressed concerns about the money that had already been put into their board
room.
Reynolds said that the cost for expansion would basically be the same no matter
how they decided to configure things and that yes, it might be costly to build
a whole new board room, but that it was doable.
After several more similar questions and concerns were expressed, Huber
reminded both boards that configuration could be given more thought, but the
main decisions that needed to be made for simply co-location and the purchase
of Maple Shade Plaza.
Board of Supervisors member Ranny Akers added that the “bottom line is whether
or not we want to be together.”
Phillips added that he thought working together would bring positive results
and that “the time has come for us to work together.”
Ultimately, both boards voted in favor of co-location and the board of supervisors
voted to purchase the Maple Shade
Plaza.
Huber noted that the Maple Shade
Plaza would serve as a
“common denominator” for any direction they decided to go in the process of
co-location.
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