Does Orleans Need A Town Campus?

ORLEANS – What could Orleans look like in 2040? If Town Manager Kim Newman’s vision comes to fruition, a number of the town’s most pressing existing needs could be met.

Town officials have been wrestling in recent years with how to address a number of issues, from the need for a new fire station and elementary school to planning for a new community center. Those projects could prove costly, and with limited available town land to accommodate them, discussion is growing around the idea of a town campus that could address those needs in one location.

“We have a number of competing priorities,” Newman told attendees of a discussion on future capital planning hosted by the Orleans Citizens Forum in January. “Is there a possibility here in which we can consolidate into one project in order to do one build, one borrow, one timeline, one location, and save the town a lot of money?”

Maybe, but voters will first need to authorize spending money at the May 13 annual town meeting for a feasibility study to identify options for developing a multi-use campus on Eldredge Park Way, where the existing fire station and Orleans Elementary School are located.

Select Board chair Michael Herman said during his board’s Feb. 14 meeting that the campus idea grew out of goals set by the select board to work with the fire department and the Orleans Elementary School committee on making headway on their respective projects. The fire station, which opened its doors in 1987, no longer meets the needs of a modern fire facility. The school committee, meanwhile, is weighing its options for what to do with the elementary school, the original portion of which dates to 1956.

Orleans Fire Chief Geof Deering said the need for a new station is long past due. The department is giving up its training room, which is being redesigned to accommodate eight new firefighters who will soon be hired to its ranks. The station also lacks adequate storage space, and staff have also been dealing with plumbing and electrical issues, he said.

“We’ve expended already, right after the first of the year, all of our building maintenance funding to make repairs to the building,” he said.

Siting a new station has been a struggle, as the department can’t relocate far outside of its current footprint if it wants to maintain appropriate response times. At the existing Eldredge Park Way site, Deering said, the department can respond to 99.6 percent of the town in eight minutes or less.

“It’s clear from the studies that we’ve done and just local knowledge that the best location for the fire station is on the southern end of Eldredge Park Way. We’ve been saying that for a long time,” he said.

There’s also the question of what to do with the elementary school. A report presented last summer to the school committee and the select board identified two options: bring the existing school completely up to code at an estimated cost of $44.6 million, or build a new school for an estimated $53.6 million.

“The lucky thing about this, at least in my opinion, is we already know we have top class elementary school education,” Herman said. “It’s award-winning, so we have that. The programming side is done on the education. We just have to give them a building that matches it.”

On Monday, the Orleans Elementary School Committee expressed support not only for the feasibility study, but for the opportunity to partner with the town on the project.

“I welcome any opportunity where we can be all together and make decisions as a group,” committee member Sasandra Roche said.

Gail Briere, who chairs the elementary school committee, said school officials have had ongoing conversations with the town about a campus since the fall, including what she called a “very productive” meeting that took place Monday ahead of the committee’s meeting. She said town officials plan to join the elementary school committee for an “open discussion” about the campus concept at the committee’s next meeting in March.

“There’s a lot of potential here to build a partnership, and I think that begins with the meeting on March 18,” she said.

A multipurpose building was also floated as a possibility in the campus design, one that would accommodate a new elementary school with additional space for other programming and community needs. Officials stressed the importance of having a flexible building that can be adaptive to the town’s changing needs in the years ahead.

But Newman said specifics about what might be included in a new campus and where can’t come into focus until voters have a chance to weigh in on the idea in May.

“There’s a lot of questions we need answered, and one of them is ‘Does the town want this?’ And that’s a big one. So we need to bring it forward and see if it’s something they’re even interested in pursuing before we hash out which thing is where.”

Briere cited two potential options for the committee. One could involve relinquishing control of the entire property to the town if a plan develops that includes a multipurpose facility that mixes both school and town uses. The other option could involve subdividing the existing land between the various needs.

Nauset School Superintendent Brooke Clenchy said the proposed feasibility study could give direction on how best to proceed with the project.

“Just because a feasibility study is done doesn’t tie our hands in any way, shape or form,” she said. “It gives us options.”

If voters support the proposed article in May, a consultant would be hired to lead the study and identify options for developing the property. The goal would be to bring a specific design back before voters for another vote in 2025.

The feasibility study would present options based on findings from past studies, including those done in support of a new fire station, school and community center.

Newman identified a new fire station as a top priority in planning for the proposed campus, and she said the campus model is the best way of making a new station a reality. Deering last week voiced support for a comprehensive effort to bring the town not just a new fire station, but the other facilities it needs.

“That’s what I like about this project,” he said. “It’s not really putting one department or one need ahead of another. It’s looking at them all together.”

Any feasibility study that might come out of May’s town meeting should also take into account some space onsite for future town needs, said Mefford Runyon of the select board. That could include the need for a new senior center in the coming years, Herman said.

But everything starts with the article set to go before voters in May. The select board was due to address the article at its meeting on Feb. 28.

And while many studies have been done in the past on many fronts, Newman said if approved, the proposed feasibility study could evolve into something actionable soon.

“This is not a study to sit on a shelf,” she said. “We will vote on something the following year.”

Email Ryan Bray at ryan @capecodchronicle.com