(Orleans)– City leaders in Orleans say they’re concerned over the condition of city hall. Maintenance of the building in the shorter term and possibly exploring a new facility in the longer term were discussed at Monday evening’s city council meeting. The existing city hall building is estimated to be some 80 to 90 years old. The council established a committee to look at recommendations and things that need to be fixed in the short term. Mayor Bill Maas…
“We need to get it winterized real well. We need to find out if there’s any serious flaws that might show up in the middle of winter when we least suspect it. So we just want to plan ahead a little bit to make sure that the aging building will be able to survive the winter and service us the way it has for many, many years.”
In addition, Maas says they simply don’t have anywhere to store supplies, including street signs…
“Several years ago here we adopted the idea that with our roads we need to have a long range plan and I think that what we need to do is start looking at our building facility, also. We don’t have any storage area. Our office here, if you have been in city hall here you realize that offices and storage places are synonymous and if you look under the front desk at city hall when we’re having council meetings there’s street signs and everything stored beneath our feet and everything else that are just laying there because we don’t have any place. So we’re starting to think down the road about, you know, what we need to do to maybe turn us into more of a viable city and start thinking about what we need to do. This building’s not going to last forever. We don’t want to be caught with being almost out in the open, so to say.”
Council members Kristine Hoss and Stan Gable were appointed to serve on the committee.
