NAHANT — The Public Safety Designer Selection Committee held its first meeting Tuesday evening, where it talked to community members about mitigating the potential dangers of a natural disaster.
Police Chief and Emergency Management Director Timothy Furlong, Assistant Director Carl Maccario, Fire Chief Austin Antrim, Town Administrator Tony Barletta and more gathered at Town Hall to update residents on town protocols in the event of a disaster.
Fire Chief Austin Antrim explained that the committee’s first meeting was an introduction to what the committee aims to accomplish.
“This is the first phase of two or three phases,” Antrim said. “This first phase is to develop a request for qualifications (RFQ) to procure an architect to do a feasibility study of the police and fire stations. Phase two would be selecting an architect to design the building, and phase three would be construction.”
Antrim added that he thinks the committee should focus on the RFQs from the previous study in 2016 to get familiar with looking at samples to determine which elements the committee would like to integrate into the project.
“The scope of work and coming up with that evaluation criteria are important to us right now,” Antrim said.
Maccario asked if the committee was required by law to get more than one proposal for the project.
“You’re supposed to get multiple, however, if one submits a proposal, you can see that that meets your expectations… Ideally, you’re trying to go out for the most competitive bid,” Finance Director Alison Nieto said.
“We develop the RFQ, procure for designers, then based on criteria we set, we rank the submittals based on their qualifications and our criteria, then we rank them and start with the top-ranked one to negotiate an agreeable fee,” Antrim said.
“Is it a done deal that we’re looking for a public safety building, or is it more of a best option?” Dan Doyle, fire union representative asked.
“What the feasibility study will accomplish is assessing the existing conditions of both fire and police departments,” Antrim said. “They’ll basically do a survey on both departments and determine how much space is needed for both.”
“Then, they configure that into a floor plan as a combined building, then they’ll look at sites. We’ll have to choose the sites and see if a building fits anywhere. I think a combined building would be so massive that it could be a very hard sell,” Antrim continued. “I think it’s important to look at this as either a combined building or separate buildings.”
Antrim confirmed the results of the study would provide the town with options on which path to choose moving forward.
“Should we focus on locations?” Chief Furlong asked.
“We should narrow them down to a few,” Antrim responded. “But there aren’t many.”
“The grassy section by the country club is huge,” Furlong said when he floated the idea of using the site. “I think that would be an ideal location, that would be massive.”
“Do we decide on whether we want separate buildings? Or does it come from the company?” Maccario asked.
“The company will come up with blueprints and decide if it can work,” Antrim responded. “If we are talking about a combined building, I think our only options are somewhere around the Johnson School property or around the country club.”
Antrim said he expects locations to be one of the main issues for the committee as it navigates its way through the first phase of the project.
The committee will have to draft qualifications to find an architect to design the feasibility study, to determine the space needs of both departments, come up with square footage, and see which sites the plans can fit in. “First thing we need to get done is finish that list of qualifications,” Antrim said.
The point was reiterated that the committee is still navigating through the early stages of the process, with the goal of its first meeting to consider different ideas and discuss how it will navigate the first phase of the project.
