By Shelbi LeMeilleur
The city of College Station will break ground on a new City Hall building in the fall later this year. Between a growing city and failing structure and amenities in the current building, the move to a new building is long overdue.
The current City Hall was built in phases, with the first part dedicated in 1969 and the last in 1983, which means it has acquired 35-plus years of wear and tear and growing pains. Some of the most recent problems the City Hall offices have had to deal with include a leaky roof due to hail damage and running out of useable office space. Many city staff work in what used to be storage closets, while departments are spread throughout other leased office spaces around the city, according to College Station Mayor Karl Mooney.
“It became very clear that this building is now to a point where it’s outlived its efficient usefulness,” says Mooney. “We have to do something, and we have to do something that’s not just going to serve our immediate needs, but something that will serve us well into the future.”
Structural problems set aside, the city of College Station has experienced tremendous growth and will continue to do so in the foreseeable future.
“I think the thing that I’m not certain all of our citizens really understand [is] how fast we’re growing,” says College Station Councilman Jerome Rektorik. In the 2010 census, the population of College Station was 93,000. It’s estimated that the population will climb to 123,000 by the 2020 census and 150,000 by 2030, according to Rektorik.
City growth doesn’t just mean more people. It also means having a growing staff to support infrastructure needs. “To accommodate our future, we are going to have to continue to accommodate the future of infrastructure of roads, water and waste water, etc., as well as continue to ensure that our staff resources are adequate to handle our growth,” explains Rektorik.
College Station City Council has been working to accommodate this growth for several years now. In fact, new City Hall discussions have been in the works for the better part of a decade.
The city of College Station was incorporated in 1938 and the first city hall was located at the corner of Wellborn Road and University Drive. The original portion of the current structure was dedicated in 1969, but a proposal to build a new city hall was brought about in 2003 when a bond issue was passed for a municipal complex, according to College Station City Councilman John Nichols. Although that plan fell through, another bond issue came up for election in 2008 during the beginning of the recession and ultimately failed. Eleven years later, the process for a new city hall is finally underway.
The new city hall building will remain on the property where the current City Hall resides. The city of College Station owns the whole block, and the new building will be on the back of the property. Once the new building is completed, city staff will transition to the new building and the existing building will be demolished, according to Mooney.
While the new city hall will remain on the current property, there were arguments to move it to other parts of town before plans were finalized.
“We did look at ideas of locating City Hall further south, but we own this land and the guiding line that you see on our beautiful new entrance sign there on University Drive [is] ‘College Station — The Home of Texas A&M University,’” says Nichols.
Ultimately, the location stayed the same for many reasons: proximity to the university, land already owned and paid for, highly visible location, and room for growth, according to James Benham, former mayor pro tem.
Benham is also part of the Architecture Advisory Committee, made up of three council members and two non-council professional advisors who represent the citizens in the placement and design of critical infrastructure, including the new city hall and police station. With tremendous growth in the city of College Station, it was important to make sure the new city hall does not outgrow the needs of the city in the near future.
“We based space and capacity planning off of a multi-decade outlook,” says Benham. “So, we believe that this space could potentially handle our space needs for the next couple of decades. That being said, this site has been designed so that we could add on buildings in a logical, orderly manner that does not look or operate haphazardly.”
Not only was it important to plan for future growth, but also to speak with staff and make sure their needs would be met in the new building.
“When they were looking at the design of the architecture and looking at the design of the building, they sat and spent time with staff members to say, ‘Ok, in your department what do you need?’ and they went to each department and talked about department needs not just for today, but, ‘What do you see for tomorrow? What do you see in the future?’” explains Rektorik.
One of the biggest needs for city staff was more meeting space, according to Jay Socol, College Station director of public communications. Often in the current building, meetings and classes were held in the council chambers (if it wasn’t otherwise in use) because it’s currently the largest space. There will also be more area for public viewing space at the council chambers in the new building. Additionally, older buildings are not typically equipped to handle modern technology. The new building has been retrofitted for the newest technologies and allows for a lot more “smart” features common in newer buildings.
“The point is, it will be very intentionally programmed, and that’s exciting,” says Socol.
There’s no question the city of College Station will continue to grow in the future. With the new city hall building, the city will be able to manage growth while giving the community and visitors a wonderful resource. Nichols agrees, saying, “I think we will have something that the city will be proud of and that will be very visible to visitors from all over the world.”
Building the New City Hall
Where is the money coming from? The total budget for the project is $33 million, according to Councilman Jerome Rektorik. Of that budget, $24 million is for construction, while $9 million is for the design, furniture, fixtures, landscaping, etc. Per Councilman John Nichols, the funding will come from a variety of sources including city fund balances, dissolving a tax increment financing zone, and certificates of obligations or bonds. To pay for the certificates of obligations, there will likely be a tax increase up to a penny.
What can be expected from the overall design? The Architecture Advisory Committee was very intentional when choosing the architectural themology of the new city hall and other city structures (including the new police station and city entryway signs), according to Former Mayor Pro Tem James Benham. The committee wanted city buildings to adhere to classic Texas municipal architecture: symmetrical, brick, pitched roofs, and columns. City Hall will have the exact red brick used in the new city entryway sign off Highway 6 entering College Station from Bryan. “It’s a building when you look at it that says, that could have been built in 1920; it could have been built in 1940; it could have been built in 1890; it could have been built in 2018,” says Benham. “You want something that’s not going to get dated within five years, and you also want something that people can be proud of.”
The building was also designed vertically, meaning it is three stories, rather than a wide one- or two-story building, according to Benham. This allows for room to accommodate future growth if ancillary buildings need to be built on the property in the future. There will also be a plaza and green spaces in front of the building.
Who else is involved in the project? The Advisory Committee is working with Kirksey Architects on the design of the project. Something unique the city of College Station did with this project is change the construction type to construction manager at risk. A traditional hard bid produces the designs and the lowest bidder wins; however, not everything in the design can always be built if not designed properly or in a way that is constructible, according to Benham. Using a construction manager at risk, the city hired Erica Wozniak as director of vertical construction. This allows the builder (Core Construction) to be engaged in the designing process, and saves money over time, as there are fewer costly mistakes.
