We're calling to order the ad hoc joint mayoral board of alderman capital and debt committee.

Mr.

Clerk, would you please call a roll?

Yes, uh, Mr.

Mayor.

Um President Wilshire.

Here.

Uh Alderman Clemens.

Uh Mr.

Mayor Alderman Clemens said that he had to come off.

He's gonna try to pop back in.

Okay.

Um Alderman uh Alderman Kelly.

I'm here.

Aldman Clee.

Here.

Uh Director Cummings is here, Director Sullivan.

Here.

Director Photo.

Present.

And Mayor Dauntis.

Here.

All right.

Seven members present.

So we have some presentations, the first being from the police department.

Um to talk about the possibility of renovating or improving the cell block area, correct?

So come on, come forward, please.

Or is she gonna present from the whatever your pleasure is?

Yes.

Good evening, Mayor.

Yes, uh Alderman Kelly.

I just wanted to ask a procedural question.

Do you want to let them get all the way through and then ask questions or ask questions as they're presenting?

Why don't we let them get through it and then um uh we'll get the questions answered.

So please begin by introducing yourself and then absolutely good evening, ladies and gentlemen.

Uh my name is Jennifer Moriarty.

I'm a captain with the Nashua Police Department.

Um currently representing the services bureau.

And go ahead with the presentation.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um so previously for capital improvements we had presented um three items that we were hoping to work on.

The first being um updated body camera contracts.

Um we have since obtained funding for this, so we're no longer requesting assistance on that, so I'm gonna focus on two additional projects that we've been looking at.

The first being our parking lot project.

Uh this item has been on capital improvement project itinerary um since 2017, and still something that we are uh very much desiring.

Currently very little um site drainage exists, resulting in flooding and damaged pavement at the police department.

The traffic flow mixes with emergency vehicles and personal vehicles as well in a confined travel area, making things very difficult for passage, especially in emergency situations.

There's no current pedestrian access from the public sidewalk to the police department and other site projects to include our most recent riverside project have reduced our parking spaces.

We utilized contingency money from the Nine Riverside project to fund a parking lot study through VHB.

Um our consultant VHB is designing a site silver project to repair the dilapidated parking lot at the police department main building.

The work includes mitigating the drainage issues, traffic flow, and to increase police department parking for both the officers and um incoming customers.

Um their required permitting will be handed uh excuse me, handled by part of the contract as the police department security gating and illumination as well.

The project is currently in the concept design phase with the hope of moving forward pending funding.

We have a meeting with VHB coming up on May 1st, where we'll sit down with the company and they will uh provide us with what they believe the design concepts should be going forward.

So at this point, I don't have what their full concept is.

We do know that the asphalt parking lot is original to the property from 1979.

The parking lot has never been repaved and is in current disrepair as a result.

There are large cracks throughout the lot and portions of the asphalt are crumbling.

The main entrance to the employee area has drainage issues as well, which has caused deterioration in the asphalt.

Repairs are made to the asphalt every year as numerous potholes appear after each winter.

The typical life expectancy of asphalt under Northeast Winter.

Weather conditions is approximately 20 to 30 years from what we've been told.

And as I had mentioned, we're requesting to meet or have a scheduled meeting with VHB on May 1st to see what designs they may propose for us going forward.

The second item that I'm here to present on is our detention facility.

So this is one of our highest liability areas.

Although it currently meets Calia standards, it's been highly recommended during our last two assessments that we upgrade to a more modern facility.

The latest assessment was in 2023.

The history of our detention facility.

The plans were designed in 1977, and minimal improvements have been made since then.

So close to 50 years of no upgrades.

The detention facility has deteriorated in criminal justice technologies.

The current design consists of multiple areas within our detention facility to include our sally port, an aphist room, which is for fingerprinting, a temporary and group holding cell, the booking area itself, 10 adult male cells, five adult female cells, three juvenile female cells, three juvenile male cells, and also padded cells included.

An intoxilizer room, so a breathalyzer room, prisoner property storage area, booking supplies storage area, and two security vestibules.

Those are the most serious risk for prisoners because we've had multiple suicide attempts, and usually those are a couple per year, where either civilians or officers are noticing via our booking cameras that people are attempting to harm themselves, and then ultimately we have to run down to that area and cut them down from injuring themselves or causing significant harm or death.

The structure of the bars has been presented in multiple instances of self-harm, as I had mentioned.

The cell bars allow prisoners to assault police officers as well, with feces and other bodily fluids being flung out of them on multiple occasions.

As recently as last week, we had a female officer that was spat upon.

Unfortunately, the saliva went into her mouth, so she had to put in for a workers' comp claim so that she could go ahead and be tested for communicable diseases and be treated.

God forbid she has any.

Current sprinkler heads are very easily accessible because of the lowness of the ceilings in the cells and have been tampered with on many occasions, also causing flooding.

We usually average three to five of those cases per year.

There is a master control system that the booking officer controls, allowing controlled movement within all of the booking areas itself.

This only intermittently works, so causing many issues there.

The bed platform is a single slab, not a cement block as most modern facilities have, allowing prisoners to get beneath it, hiding from us or causing additional harm to themselves.

So several officers will go in and remove the prisoner, which is a very dangerous situation for all involved parties.

So the prisoners hiding beneath this particular bench is very difficult and challenging to get them out.

In addition to that, the dimensions of the cells themselves are very narrow in comparison to modern facilities that we've seen, also making it difficult for multiple people to gain entry, and especially if an officer is in need of help.

The cell, as recently as 2019 and 2022, we had prisoners that had to be cut down after attempting to hang themselves from the bars in the current cells.

With the current cells, we're able to introduce chemical agents such as foam OC spray, so a pepper spay, pepper spray, but that's in a foam, so it doesn't cross contaminate other people that are in the holding cells as well.

However, because of the cell structure and the bars, the prisoners are able to essentially pick up the foam and fling it back out, exposing officers to it as well, so posing additional safety hazards for us.

There's a series of pictures that you'll find in the handouts.

So the first images is our actual current booking facility.

So the area here is where the booking officer is typically situated, and you can see at the counter on the right, there's no type of barrier that prevents prisoners from just jumping up and over and assaulting.

We have both civilian staff that work in there and police officers, depending upon the day and shift.

On the following page, you'll see a better view of the counter itself, pretty outdated.

We have an interview room that is beneath that.

Prisoner storage, which is essentially self-made cubbies, so that we have area to house people's property.

The lower image that's a little on the darker side.

I apologize for the quality of some of these.

That's one of our padded cells.

Booking storage area, which is typically where we'll have blankets, food for prisoners, that sort of nature.

And then the final image down there is one of the actual cells currently.

So you can see it's fairly narrow in comparison to some images that you'll see shortly.

You can see the locking mechanism, the toilet with the flushing device right on top of it there.

And an attorney client interview room.

And then just a couple of images of our paperwork area in fingerprinting areas, all of all in great need of upgrading.

The current operational operational deficiencies of our existing facility pose critical limitations to our overall effectiveness in the police department at this point.

Throughout modernization, we could demonstrate our commitment to reduce liability and a stronger defense against civil lawsuits.

The renovation was submitted to capital improvements for 2025 and 2026 for the detention facility, and is additionally documented in our multi-year plan.

During this past December, Deputy Defava, myself, and accreditation manager Bill Pease.

We began researching other local police departments to see what we would be looking for that would work in our type of a police department.

We visited multiple agencies to include Hampton, Weston, Manchester, Brockt, Lexington, Sudbury, Quincy.

This all provided us with pretty good ideas of what would work in our facility dependent upon the size of the other facilities that we looked at.

So the initial image there is actually just a concrete block, which is the prisoner bed area, so posing less possible injury to officers and the inability for prisoners to get beneath it.

The close-up image on the bottom there is the exterior door.

So we are still able to provide food and sustenance water to the prisoners through that small that entry there with a more secure locking facility without the ability of being exposed to any bodily substances that may come out at us.

On the following page, you'll see remote flushing toilets.

So several of the agencies, in fact, most of them now have an area where the booking officer only has the ability to do the flushing, so we won't have additional flooding in there, and less likelihood of contraband being flushed.

Tamper-proof sprinkler heads, also an image of that.

That would greatly reduce problems in house with that.

And a new master control panel, just an image of how Brockton Police Department had their setup, which we thought it was similar to how ours is set up now, but a newer version that's functioning.

And then the remote flushing control station beneath that.

The following page, you'll see a new booking intake area.

So Brockton PD, we particularly liked this one because in speaking with multiple agencies, some of them had windows that were essentially from the counter all the way up to the ceiling, making it very difficult to hear prisoners have conversation or read over any paperwork that they needed to be advised of.

So this here still provides a barrier of protection for the person working behind the booking counter, but at the same time will have the ability to hear the person who's in custody.

New evidence lockers.

So they have all of their lockers and refrigeration for any type of evidence that needs to be controlled temperature.

We're in the process of obtaining funding for a detention facility study.

We've located and met with several architects who have direct experience in this type of renovation.

During the course of this memorandum, we researched architects in the area who specialized in detention facilities and working with municipalities.

The first one who we contacted was Lynn Associates.

Galante Architecture, they actually came down as well, and we had a very nice in-person meeting with them.

And then finally, um CaseL Booze, if I'm saying that properly, associates.

And they met with us on multiple occasions, sort of finalizing what they thought would be decent setup for us, so we're hoping to work with them.

It is estimated that this the cost of this project is going to be upwards of three million dollars.

And I'm not sure if I had mentioned on the parking lot that was upwards of 1.5 million.

All right.

Um just one other item, which is that uh in the budget, the alderman will be receiving next week.

There is money for an initial beginning the design of this project, just so they know that.

Uh in event, any questions?

Questions of anybody?

Uh Alder Woman Clee.

Uh thank you.

It's not just so much questions as it's just comments.

Um, it was probably about five years ago that I actually had a tour of the facility, and I remembered at that time when they spoke about the um cells, and when I when I saw them and so on, and they had concerns even way back then, and I'm sure you have heard them.

Sorry.

Um, so I I'm glad to see that they're being attended to.

But the question I have is that we do get the Calia, we get really great grades with that and so on.

But you commented that this was something that they brought up.

Was it kind of like an exception of saying, you know, you have this good rating, however, this is something of an area of concern or recommendation.

Excuse me, I'm sorry.

That's okay.

It wasn't necessarily an area of concern.

They simply said that because of the risk factor that they would recommend modernizing it.

We still met our standard in that area.

Um, but it was documented, and they actually I think I printed autocopy of it.

If you bear with me one moment, I apologize.

That's okay.

I'm I just I'm glad that it was.

Yeah, I I just want to know whether or not it was a um a recommendation area concern or was something that potentially the next Calia we could kind of be gigged on it.

Um that was my big concern.

It was yes, it was definitely a recommendation.

Okay, thank you.

You're welcome.

Older woman Kelly.

Uh thank you.

I am then a leadership cohort.

We got to see Valley Street.

It reminded me their control room and area looks very similar, so probably similar age.

Uh I had a question about the parking lot.

Sure.

I know that the energy environment committee has been trying to make sure that we're moving a little bit more into hybrid and um electric vehicles.

And if I recall at least four or five years ago, we talked about potentially doing hybrid patrol cars, but we were concerned about that infrastructure.

So are you in the I know you're about to see it, but are you considering at least putting the infrastructure in um for that kind of pivot?

I know that we do have the um electric vehicle charging stations, but specifically um our fleet usually will do the presentations on that because they do all the cruiser analysis.

So I don't think that I could talk intelligently on that particular part, but I would say that whatever our setup that we're looking for, we want to make sure that we have because we do currently have a couple of electric vehicles in our fleet.

Well, there are there are um hybrid cruisers.

Oh, yes, I apologize completely electric.

I apologize, yes.

Follow up.

Pardon?

And maybe Director Foto can help.

But I'm just thinking fleet management.

You said you have some you have two.

Is that what you said?

Um so we have the majority of our fleet is hybrid now.

I apologize for that from the speaking.

Um, but as far as electric vehicles, we have um we have at least two.

Our ACO van is electric, and we also have um a lightning, a Ford Lightning that is electric.

Alderman Dowd.

Yeah, I just like this put in more information on the holding area.

It's uh it's a safety item uh for both police officers and prisoners.

Um I don't know where we fit in in our schedule, but I think it it definitely needs to be handled in the next year or two.

Um because was pointed out, um, you know, is somebody's gonna get hurt.

People get hurt all the time on in that area, and while it might meet current minimum conditions, um it uh I I think that you know we're subjecting our police officers to more danger than we need to.

So I think at some point we need to address this, and the sooner the better, in my opinion.

The parking lot is in terrible condition, and uh as Alman Wilshier and I both know from going there very often.

Um it's got drainage problems, it's only got one sewer in the entire parking lot.

The the uh topography of the parking lot is you know, I don't know who designed it, but it's terrible.

And um a lot of work needs to be done to the the parking lot.

Now, having said that, they they had the money to design the new paving.

Um it should be considered again the word fits on with all our other projects is what this committee's gonna have to figure out, but uh it definitely needs work.

All right, anyone else?

Um excuse me, Director Sullivan.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayer.

Uh just a brief question.

Uh the confirming the cost of the detention block is how much?

The detention block, um the actual projected cost of the entire project would be upwards of three million.

The parking lot.

The parking lot upwards of 1.5 construction costs.

Okay.

I thought those were actually the opposite in the CIP, but I'd now understand that clarification.

Okay.

And I also think it would be fair to say that those numbers are being given with absolutely no design to the to the detention cell area.

I expect we would hold them to those numbers for joke, obviously.

But yeah, understood.

Thank you.

Alderwoman Cleeve.

Uh thank you.

Um, did I hear you say that the well the parking lot is 1.5 million?

Um, was it just the design or the that was part of the um riverside?

The design itself.

Um so we will be finding out on May 1st, hopefully, um, what exactly their ideas for the design is, but they did a parking lot study where VHB was on the property um even to the point where they were doing monitoring traffic during multiple shifts to see the coming and going of officers and the um the areas that were the tightest and the most dangerous for us.

I I remember discussions such as this during the um joint uh meeting of infrastructure, so on so but I just want a clarification.

So this 1.5 is after design.

Correct.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Alder Woman Kelly.

Uh thank you.

So to the numbers.

Um I'm looking at last year's general operation plan.

It said three and a half million, and your paper that you pass out today is three.

So is that 500,000 the soft cost that you're thinking of in terms of planning, or has it come down in price?

Um so this was just a general cost that we were given.

Um again, that hasn't actually fully been posed until we have the architect architectural design of it.

Okay, thank you.

You're welcome.

Anyone else?

All right.

Well, thank you very much.

Thank you very much.

Nice of you to come in.

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Now, next we have the library, and Ms.

McCormick is here.

It's usually in the door.

Uh good evening, everyone.

Jennifer McCormick, library director.

Thank you for the opportunity to talk to you tonight.

Um a little lighthearted beginning.

I created this PowerPoint presentation by myself without any help from our graphic designer.

So Alderman Kelly, just close your eyes and forgive me.

Um Director Cummings asked me to talk about the library's top three capital priorities.

I have only two on my list.

Um I could come up with a third, but these are really our two highest priorities.

The first being a complete renovation of our building, and I've added with addition on there, and I'll talk to about that in a minute as a result of the feasibility study.

The option the trustees have chosen does involve some demolition and an addition.

The estimated total cost of that project is 45 million, and I'll insert Director Cummings' comment here.

We've had very limited design, really no design, um, but we're committed to that 45 million dollar cost.

Additionally, um this is number two on the list, but it is equal in importance, the renovation of the plaza.

If you visited the library recently, you know it is in really poor condition.

That project's fully designed, we know the cost of it, um, and the funding is actually already in place for that.

I wanted to give you a little bit of a history, set the stage for how we got here.

So I've got a little bit of a timeline.

I know it's difficult to read on the screen.

This story starts in 2010 when you hired a new library director named Jennifer McCormick.

And lived in Exeter at the time and was commuting here.

Uh, and I'm still really happy to be here.

And when I got to Nashua and started work, the library had just had a new roof installed.

And with the remainder of those capital funds, we started replacing the carpet on the main floor.

Uh it was a pretty big project because we moved, took all the books out, moved the stacks, and put carpet underneath.

And shortly after that, my capital improvement submittals started to include a renovation of our HVAC system and repairing the bricks on the outside of the building because water was coming in.

In 2016 to 2017, we renovated the Chandler wing.

That used to be the music art and media wing.

Now, if you've been to the library, you know that's where all of our meeting rooms are, our seed library, our puzzle swap.

There's um also a computer training room there now.

That project I would like to know it was paid for without any city funds.

That was all trust funds and revenue from the sale of the Chandler building.

Total cost of that project was around a half a million dollars.

2019, we started designing the plaza.

It's 2006 26 now, that was seven years ago.

And in 2019, we actually had phase one of that project ready to go.

Um, and I believe a contractor had already been chosen, and then COVID hit and that project was stalled, but we didn't give up.

And in 2022, uh our plaza renovation was awarded some congressionally directed spending funds.

And at that time, we also started redesigning that project.

Um concrete continued to deteriorate, and we made some significant adjustments to the play area.

Also, in I skipped one.

Also in 2022, the trustees employed design lab architects to do a full um technical assessment of the building.

Uh took them six or eight months.

Most of you have seen that report, and I'll talk about the findings for that.

Um, long story short, they recommended a full renovation of the building.

Uh, and that report is available on our website uh if you haven't seen it already.

Fast forward to 2025.

The trustees hired design lab again to conduct a space needs assessment and feasibility study.

And the cost of that study was shared between the trustees, used some trust funds, and the city committed some funds.

They looked at four different options for the library project, did a lot of community engagement, and ended up with a determination of how much and what kinds of space we needed and even some costing to that.

2026, here we are.

We are ready to start the next phase of design for the library renovation.

Thanks to the Board of Alderman, there's already been one million dollars allocated to that project, and we are actively working on hiring an architectural firm for the design services for that project.

Along with that, and I've added these because many people in this room have heard me talk about this, two other projects related to the library that have been ongoing.

We did spend some money on a study of our heating ventilation and air conditioning system to see what would be required to get it operational in a more functional fashion.

The results of that study was cost about a million dollars to get that system operational with a lifespan of that project to be three to five years.

There was limited response to that, and that's not a project that we're moving forward.

So that just sets the stage of the last 16 and a half years of the library building, and throughout this time, I've continued to submit up until 2022 the same projects.

We need to fix the bricks, we need to fix the HVAC, we need to fix the bricks.

There really isn't a solution that would get you a little bit of a band-aid, but it would not upgrade the library.

Every single one of our building systems, except the boilers are past their intended service life.

And I will say this report was published in 2022 here in 2026.

The boilers are now 16 years old, 15 years old, 14 years old.

So they're advancing as well.

Components of the envelope, building envelope, require repair or replacement.

We found out that behind the bricks there is missing or improperly installed flashing, so water is coming in the building in multiple locations.

The windows are original to the building.

Building opened in 1971.

Many, many of the windows are still single-pane glass, except for the ones that have been broken and replaced.

There are multiple life safety building code and accessibility deficiencies.

Going to show you some pictures of the most egregious, our fire panel being one of them.

The building is not sprinkled.

We have only one handicapped accessible restroom in the 60,000 square foot building.

Our stairs do not meet code on and on.

Some illustrations.

Some of them are a little bit hard to see.

That photo on the top left, that small compressor, that runs the pneumatic controls for our whole 60,000 square foot building.

That little electric device runs all the time because the pneumatic system leaks.

Underneath it, you'll see that is an air duct which delivers fresh air to the building.

And that lever that says open and close, that is how we control temperature in parts of the building.

When it's warm outside, we open it and let fresh air come in.

When it's cold outside, we have to close it, or staff offices get down into the 50s.

That illustration in that photograph in the middle, that's our fire panel.

I believe that fire panel is 30 years old.

It is an original to the building, so we can say that.

Just going further, if you visited the building, you'll see that.

So there's different words for those bump outs in the building.

From the inside, we call them alcoves because they're places you can go into from the outside, they're bump house.

They are all covered with moss, lichen, dirt.

It's many times been recommended that we wash the building.

Not only is that expensive, if you look at the next photo, that is what the walls look like on the inside of those bump outs because of water infiltration.

Not people blasting it with a hose, but just rain and snow melt.

We scraped them and repainted and scraped them and repainted.

It is a hopeless case.

So at this point, when you come inside, 90% of those alcoves are cordoned off and no longer used for seating or for storing books or for stacks.

That particular corner you're looking at is above the biography stacks in the children's room.

So last year, this we I think the final report was presented to the Board of Trustees and was finally approved in January of 2026.

But the study was actually complete completed last fall.

Feasibility looked at four different options for what the future of the library could look like.

What if we renovated, just renovated the building as it sits?

What if we renovated it but changed some of it?

And that's the option that the trustees went for, removing some part of the easternmost wing of the building and reshaping that in a more rectangular fashion.

That achieves two goals.

It brings the entrance to the building closer to the parking lot.

So when people are parking and walking to the building, they're inside and accessing library services faster.

And it also introduces a central stair and a new elevator, so that when you come in the front door of the building, you can see everything, and you can see that there's a downstairs and there's a reasonable way to get to it.

We also looked at what if we just tore the building down and built brand new?

That's a question we get asked a lot.

Wouldn't it be cheaper just to build something new?

That turns out not to be true.

And um Alderman told us that would be the case, and he was right.

And finally, we thought, well, the library's sitting on some really prime real estate aesthetically, right there on the river.

Does it make sense to build something new on the parking lot, tear the existing building down?

Um that also turned out not to be really a suitable option.

There is not enough space on the parking lot to get the building size we need without going up for stories.

Um bless you.

So after studying all of those options, the trustees chose the addition option.

That particular design does the best at meeting the community priorities in a sustainable and affordable fashion.

Could I interrupt this for a second?

Um Alderman Clemens has joined the meeting uh via a Zoom link, so he shouldn't be recorded as present.

He has to thank you.

He has to thank you, Mr.

Mayor, and I apologize for the interruption.

I have uh returned.

I can hear everybody.

The reason I am participating remotely is because I am taking care of my wife who is ill, and um I think that covers it.

Thank you.

So there has been a joint special committee formed, or it is forming um library board of trustees and the infrastructure committee of the board of aldermen to continue work on this capital project.

What I lost my train of thought.

I was going pretty good there.

Total cost of this project is 45 million dollars.

The next phase of design, Director Cummings will correct me.

We expect to be approximately 3.4 million dollars to get us through schematic design, design development, and bid documents, potentially construct construction.

Construction documents.

So that's that's the building renovation in a nutshell.

Um I can keep going on plaza or do we want to ask questions in between?

Keep going.

Let's uh address the building now.

Alderwoman Clee.

Uh thank you.

Um, Mr.

Mayor, I um I can tell you, and I think I've spoken to you about this, that uh um some of my constituents on the opposite side of the river have often said viewing the building is atrocious because of everything.

And I know that um I've reached out to public works and asked about whether or not we could do any of that cleaning, and it wasn't just the leaking into it, but it was also the the mortar between the bricks and the damage that it would cause that would create all kinds of damage.

So I was glad that you did um show that.

Um my concern um with the present state of it, and I'm I'm glad we're not using it when you showed that little alcove and you talked about the painting.

Is that mold underneath the and I say this because I worked at a VA where we used to watch daily the mold grow underneath the base.

So I can say I am not sure if that's mold.

I can tell you that we have had an uh air quality study done of the library, and we are um it is a safe place to be and spend time.

Okay.

I'm not sure that my office was a safe place to be at the Bedford VA, but we we joked.

We sometimes would make a little mark to see how long it would take to get, and it was days, it would grow very very quickly.

So thank you.

That is in us older woman Kelly.

I actually was going to ask if you could uh quickly talk about the plaza reservation because my my questions are applied to both.

Okay, I can I can certainly move on.

So plaza renovation, as I already said, planning for this project began in 2019, and then we chose to redesign it.

It is fully designed, we are ready.

We could go out to bid tomorrow.

But Director Sullivan won't do that.

Uh there is teasing him.

There is four and a half million dollars.

Our funding already secured between ARPA funds and the congressionally directed spending.

Could you repeat that, Hamon?

There are four and a half million dollars of funding already established.

Thank you.

And I'm getting back on my bookbox here.

This project corrects some really serious issues with the plaza.

It also will create a lovely, active, attractive green space and play space for library visitors and for downtown neighborhoods, but we cannot do nothing about this plaza.

It has inadequate lighting, which creates an unsell unsafe and really unwelcoming atmosphere.

And not only at night, but even it's just cloudy and stormy in the afternoon.

It is does not meet accessibility requirements.

The hill from the parking lot is too steep.

It offers no rest pauses.

The hardscape outside has shifted, so water pools against the building and floods the stairway.

There are trip hazards everywhere due to uneven surfaces, including erosion along the walkway, which will snap your ankle.

The concrete steps are deteriorating.

The fountain has not worked in years.

We are exploring replacing the pump and the motor.

That's approximately $10,000 at the time, and then discovered that the masonry was crumbling and disintegrating.

Since we've been working on the plaza redesign now for seven years, we just let the fountain go because that was going to be part of the project.

But it's become an eyesore, and I'm pretty sure there's a vegetable garden growing in it this spring.

So here's just some photographs that will illustrate it.

That one on the top left is one side of the stairs going up to the upper plaza.

On the bottom left, that was an unsuccessful photograph, but I was trying to demonstrate the way the um it's a trip hazard, so things have shifted.

So the sidewalk part is at a different level than the plaza part.

Those wooden benches are original to the building, and the paint is all peeling.

They are fastened to the concrete, so not easily moved.

That illustration photograph in the middle shows you the pathway from the parking lot up to the front doors.

And the one on the right is particularly lovely.

That is the crumbling concrete that holds the railing.

Um theoretically keeps people from falling over into the plaza.

It did used to be a lovely jump for the skateboarders that started up at the Court Street theater entrance and would jump over it.

And finally, I prepared just a few statistics to demonstrate the impact that the library has on our community.

I know there are people, and I hear from them who wonder do we need a library and who goes there anyway?

Well, we had 193,000 visitors in fiscal year 25, and we're on track to exceed that.

377,000 items were checked out from us.

2841 museum passes were borrowed, and that seems like a small amount, but every family that uses it saves 25 to 30 dollars on museum admission, and that allows low-income families to access cultural attractions that they wouldn't normally be able to afford.

Over 18,000 people attended our programs.

4,623 meeting room uses.

That's huge.

Tonight, while I was in the audience here, I was getting messages from staff that a group of seven people were so desperate for a room, they reserved one of our study rooms, which has a capacity of two people to hold their meeting.

They are in demand and we are overbooked all the time.

There's a million other stats that I could share with you, but those really stood out to me as demonstrating the way that customers use our building, your constituents, my neighbors use the building every day.

The building is in terrible deteriorating condition.

A brand new building or a renovated building will allow us to provide the library services that the community is requesting and library services that that um represent the city in a more flattering light, if I can put it that way.

And I will step down off my soapbox and entertain other questions.

So I'll make a comment, then I'll ask some questions.

But you don't have to convince me that the library is the heart of our community.

100% is, and I'm sure it's no surprise to anyone that I spent most of my childhood in our library.

Um I actually had friends come into town and they wanted to go to the Boston Public Library, and I hadn't been in a while.

And I don't know if you've seen, but the renovation is unbelievable.

And all I could think about is this is what our library could look like.

It was being used in a really it was it's just beautiful.

If you haven't seen it, it's it's stunning.

Um so it gave me a lot of hope.

Um and I know that you do a lot with a very little.

Um so I appreciate that as well because our library is an absolute gem, and it just needs to look a little nicer and function a little better.

Um I had asked you this question, but I'm gonna ask it again.

Umbe it's a timeline thing, but obviously it seems to make sense to do the things at the same time, right?

Doing the plaza and then doing the building, is that gonna create issues where you don't even have an architectural design yet?

Uh but also is there urgency because it's pouring into the so this is a really hard question, and we're all just a little Matt.

I'm gonna answer this and then I will let you answer it, please.

I completely agree that it does not make sense to renovate the plaza and then introduce contractors to then tear half of it up and renovate the building.

But if we are going to stay in that building for any more than another year, we just cannot wait.

So commit to the building renovation and move us to a temporary spot in the next year or so, or we have to do something.

It is a hazard, and I hope Jen Deshays is listening.

Uh the risk department should be worried.

It is an injury waiting to happen and damage is actively being done to our building.

Director Sullivan, I'm sorry.

No, I think that's that's accurate.

Uh you know, our intent had been to bid out uh the library plaza project.

It is 100% designed.

We have all pieces in place.

We have spent some of that 400 4.5 million dollars on designing the project in full.

Uh we have project management available to us as part of that.

Enter the recent progress over the last six months to a year by Director McCormick, Director Cummings on advancing the renovation project.

It simply does not make sense to advance the plaza, complete that work only to tear it up, nor do I expect that HUD would be happy with us.

HUD is the administrator of the CDS congressionally directed spending money, nor do I expect that HUD would be pleased with us doing that to an asset that that they then have invested in.

So uh our intent is to hold on proceeding with the plaza project, as Director McCormick says, unless we learn that there is a substantial timeline until the renovation project can be completed.

And I don't think it's anyone's intent to hold the plaza project hostage, if you will, until those until there's policy direction given here.

But simply put, that is the best logistic and phasing strategy for this.

Uh so that's why we're on hold until we understand fully what the entire site design and build out will look like.

If I may, Mr.

Mayor.

Oh yeah.

Thank you.

Uh so um I feel like I should comment on this because in full disclosure, I feel like I was the one who poured cold water on this because the truth comes out.

And right for good reason.

Rightfully so, because I started to to ask some very technical questions that I think um it brought to light some issues that I I am very sensitive to the fact that I don't think anyone here would want us to be in the position of having to answer to if we were to proceed in haste.

And so uh I see the momentum that we're we're going uh in.

We have legislation that was filed today to actually create the joint ad hoc body.

Um it's my anticipation that we will have contracts before that body sometime in May.

Uh and we would be in earnest under design, so I don't think you know we would behoove any of us to let the plaza project get too far out in front of us.

Thanks.

Can I have a couple follow-ups?

Alderman Down.

Alderman Kelly status for the follow-up, please follow up then.

So the question that both of you left me with is you had talked about you have one year before you need to be somewhere else.

In both of these discussions when you've been planning the plaza and the potential build, have we talked about where the temporary library could be?

Talk about it every day.

What what are the answers?

Waiting for a miracle.

I think there to be, I'm being facetious, but I think to be a little bit more um clear about that.

There are some decisions to be made ahead of time, and I did talk to my board of trustees about this.

Um we need to get clear on how much space we really require.

In the current building, we say it's a 60 60,000 square foot building, but library programming only occupies about 37,000 square feet of that.

So we're looking for a temporary location, it won't be 37,000 square feet, but how many square feet does it need to be?

One part of that discussion is how many staff are we bringing with us to the temporary location?

And are the trustees committed to keeping everybody on that was employed at the time when we move.

Uh the other question to be answered is are are the trustees committed to staying in the downtown area?

That's important, that's one of our values.

We serve the downtown neighborhoods, but there is not a whole lot of real estate available.

Uh, I think we could consider be operating out of two locations if necessary.

So okay.

Do you have an empty commercial building with 20,000 square feet or so bookmobile?

Oh no, lots of books.

Yeah, no, that's another.

So if you were couldn't hear it, Shoshana just said, what about the bookmobile?

It's definitely part of our plan of service model in a temporary location is to have the ability to be mobile and be out in the neighborhoods in one way or another.

Thank you.

Alderman Down.

My first thought was that canning company that didn't open that buildings available.

Oh but uh another possibility is if we don't get moving on Elm Street, you got room at Elm Street you could use possibly for a year.

Um the old gym, it's good size, and right down the hallway is a couple of workshops that are should be totally empty that probably aren't, but they're huge.

So the space, I mean, if you had to, and and and if the if we don't get going on the Elm Street project, uh we we have no idea what the timing is going to be on that.

Um but yeah, I think we shouldn't lock down a space before we uh go much further.

The other thing is it's concerned me for a long time, and director Sullivan certainly knows this.

I'm concerned about that funding because I don't trust the government as far as I can throw them.

And and if we don't lock that money up somehow, are we going to lose it?

And and I think that would be terrible because then you're gonna have to add that four plus million dollars on to the 44 million dollars.

Now you're talking like 50 million dollars because if we have to pay for the plaza, but I think once you have the construction darrings and and you tell a construction uh company that you like to not encroach on the plaza as much as possible, you may be able to do start the plaza and do part of it as soon as you know what their uh impingements going to be with their equipment.

We don't know what that is, but once we have a design and they know what they're doing, then they could probably not go too far into the plaza.

Um if they want to store material, I'm sure there's plenty of room in the parking lot because you're gonna close the parking lot if the library is not there.

So um getting the construction drawings on the project would be critical to finding that out.

And if we find out that they can do it without impinging on the park, then I think we ought to start doing that as soon as possible.

Uh thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Um thank you for this.

And I um I did want to add you were talking about the library of community asset, and I think there were two things that you did not list on here.

And one is are we still doing the borrowed items?

Um the library of things, yes.

The library of things, which is very exciting, and I love I love the library of things.

And also you hold the free tickets to the Nashville Center for the Arts.

We do, yes, as part of our museum program.

Right.

So you know, I I think that the public needs to know that our library is more than just books and videos and and space for meetings.

We have I I was actually blown away by the library of things and the different items that you have in there and so on.

Um and you know, recently the public was talking about the National Center of Arts, and I know that's a whole different project, but but that the that the um that there are free tickets first come first serve kind of thing, and and you guys kind of manage um that to some extent and so on so um it's these little things that we don't know about which makes the library as important about books as that.

And it's also I think sometimes it's also a safe place because you have children's programming and things like that, and I think it's places where um families can go for free and and and have some somewhat of an entertainment.

You do have a lot of programming, so um, I want the public to understand that.

Thank you.

Alder Woman Kelly.

Oh, okay, thank you.

Um couple follow-ons.

So with the plaza renovation committed money, are there deadlines for when we have to use the money?

Uh yes, there are deadlines related to uh the monies.

I can confirm those deadlines after this meeting.

Uh but I will just say there's always a risk that congressionally directed spending money could be uh re-obligated until we start spending it.

But we have been very hesitant to do that until we are absolutely certain that we're prepared to move forward with the full project.

So the only monies that we have spent to date are in fact from the 1.5 million dollar pool that was allocated to the project as part of the ARPA dollars that Director McCormick mentioned.

So uh you could argue whether that was the right strategy.

I tend to think it was, uh, but there's always risk that CDS monies could be pulled back, it's pulled back at some point in time, so it behooves us to spend that money or obligate it as quickly as possible.

Okay, great.

Can I follow up?

Um so my other question, and maybe this is the committee because I wasn't on the last one.

There was a project on the last draft around the masonry and windows repair for about six million.

I'm assuming that's sort of gone away in the lieu of building a whole new library wrapped up into the bigger project.

Okay, thank you.

Alderman Down.

Um we just mentioned the performing arts center.

There's a bottom floor in that that's not being used at all, is it?

I don't think I've ever heard of it being used.

Could that be used?

Uh it maybe have to look into the logistics of having a library there with daytime hours and stuff, but that's another thing you could look into.

If I if I may, Mr.

Mayor.

I think that's uh a wonderful suggestion along with all the other ones, and we should absolutely evaluate it because there is a basement there that we could look at.

I don't know if it would work, but we should add it to the list and and look at it.

I know there's fine things.

All right.

Anyone else?

Well, thank you.

Thank you, uh Ms.

McCormick.

Thank you, everyone.

Anyone who wants a tour, the mayor's come for a tour, Alderman Sullivan's comfort tour.

I could I'm always there.

Thank you, everyone.

The best part is the thing you have to move to I'll do the to the temperature.

The temperature control, yeah.

That's unbelievable.

I know I circled it.

All right.

Well, I think the business for this evening is completed.

Is there a motion or uh look to um Alderwoman Wilshire?

Move to adjourn.

Oh well, would you please call the roll?

Uh yes.

Uh President Wilshire.

Yes.

Uh Alderman Clemens.

Yes.

Alderwoman Kelly.

Yes.

Alderman Klee.

Yes.

Uh Director Cummings is yes.

Director Sullivan.

Yes.

Director Photo.

Yes.

And the mayor.

Yes.

And it's unanimous.

And the meeting is adjourned at 9.05 p.m.