The town took a couple of steps at Monday night’s Select Board meeting toward moving the town’s $63.5 million Public Safety Buildings project forward.
The board voted unanimously to approve a $12 million bond anticipation note to cover initial soft costs of the project, and also voted to lease temporary office space to house Town Hall operations (including police and fire) for a period of up to two years during construction of the new facilities.
The project includes renovation and additions to the Town Hall/Police and Fire departments and the addition of a new Fire Department headquarters facility at the South Lynnfield fire station.
Town Administrator Rob Dolan said the town has an AA+ bond rating and “received an excellent interest rate.”
“The town has been authorized to borrow $63.5 million. Right now we are borrowing $12 million merely to cover design costs,” Dolan said. “As part of that process, we were fully evaluated by Standard & Poors and have a current bond rating of AA+, which is an incredibly strong bond rating. We went on the market and we have received an excellent interest rate of 2.573 percent, which is less than we budgeted, and so we are ready to move forward on design costs and are getting ready for a big project in the fall.”
Select Board Chair Phil Crawford said he was “very happy with the interest rate in today’s environment and thinks it’s a great start getting these soft costs paid for.”
Fellow board member Joe Connell said it was an “incredible interest rate so we are pretty lucky.”
The temporary office space will be located in the downtown area at the site of the former Village Pharmacy located 590 Main Street. The lease also includes the space above the pharmacy at 590A Main St.
“We are going to have to evacuate the police, main fire, as well as Town Hall. We researched all properties in the area for buildings such as this for staff and the Senior,” said Dolan. “But the Main Street business center will be the focus for the majority of the population for people looking for building permits, licenses, and planning with Bob (Assistant Administrator Curtin) and myself there with the DPW, so there will be one central place to go. I think we have a very reasonable deal for the next two years.”
Capital Project Manager John Scenna said that the town will be paying an average of $36 per square foot per year “for all of the space we are renting.”
He said the larger spaces will cost $39 per square foot and the smaller spaces will cost just under $20 per square foot.
