Tosa residents are going to weigh-in on the proposed new fire station when it goes to an advisory referendum on April 1.

Seems our two mayoral candidates have weighed-in as well.

The big discussion seems to have centered around the final amount to put in the referendum.

Should it have been a $12.5 million fire station - as both the chief and the architects suggested? Stepaniak thinks so.

Seems it is going to be an $11.5 million fire station as some members of the council and candidate Didier have wanted.

Apparently $1 million is the magic number.

This savings of 8% halves the life expectancy of the physical structure from 75-100 years to 25-50 years.

I've been thinking about the logic of this.

Suppose the city took that $1 million in savings and banked it at 6%. In 25 years the city would have approximately $4.5 million to put towards a replacement fire station.

Let's assume that new construction costs increase at 4% a year. The $11.5 million fire station would cost roughly $31.2 million 25 years hence.

Where is the savings?

Let's suppose we squeezed 50 years of life out of the $11.5 million fire station.

If the city banked the $1 million savings at 6% - in 50 years the city would have approximately $20 million to put towards a replacement fire station.

Again an unfortunate consequence rears its ugly head. At 4% the $11.5 million fire station would now cost $84.7 million.

Where are we saving money?

Consider this-

Would the city actually bank any potential savings on a building project?

Nope, not on your life.

So my question to candidate Didieris this.

Are my new construction estimates too high?

Just wondering.

At $11.5 million I'd be willing to bet that this project will come-in over budget when it finally gets off the ground.

All this posturing for nothing.

What does anybody else think?

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Duct tape is like the force. It has a light side, a dark side, and it holds the world together

I don't know the answer in this case. But parking is only going to be more problematic as time goes on. It makes sense to find ways to encourage all buildings that can to include parking on top or underneath, rather than using valuable space for asphalt and more parked cars.

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Get off the teat?! We are the teat.

Why not have a city wide maintaintance facility for all city vehicles around the dump or behind the police station? PM and small repairs can still be done at indivdual sites.

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The dickens you say.

I am disappointed in the comments made by one of the mayoral candidates about the proposed fire station. "I think it borders on foolish...to save a relatively small amount of money but effectively cut the life of the building in half."

First, it is problematic that one can predict the useful life of a particular building before it is built. How is it then credible that one can predict that cutting some unknown aspects of the building plan results in cutting the building life in half?
Second if the money can be saved by eliminating an aspect such as underground parking, it is mocking the intelligence of the electorate to state that reducing the cost results in cutting the useful life of the building in half. I thought we were building a fire station not a parking garage.

It is true that if the underground parking were eliminated there would be other costs. What I would have hoped from the candidate was an honest description of the impact of potential cost reductions not scaring the public making unfounded predictions.

I was leaning toward voting for that candidate. I am disappointed in the comments and I no longer am sure that he is someone I would feel comfortable as mayor.

I was hoping for someone who would represent the issues fairly and honestly. Maybe I am hoping for too much.

My recollection of the discussion at the meeting I attended was that surface parking would cut into the space needed to get the fire trucks in and out of the station. This information came from a representative of Zimmerman. It made sense to me. The information would be on the Website, in the minutes for that meeting. If I have a chance today, I'll hunt for the minutes and post a link.

Disclaimer: I was listening to the discussion without having much background information (none, actually) so some of the points of discussion were lost on me .....therefore, I may not be getting this right, so don't quote me.

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Hitchens’ Razor: What can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.

Thank you for pointing that out. I was specifically looking for site plans, which are at the very bottom of the page you pointed out. Hopefully with $11 million on the line, the city can place this information prominently on the front page.

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If you're easily offended, then you're easily manipulated.

Funny nobody has commented on my conjecture.

That's why I saved it for last.

Here's how to read between the lines.

One candidate wants to appeal to the crowd that is anti-tax. You know, the holy grail of no taxes, no spending.

The other candidate was being upfront.

Maybe I'm just a cranky cynic, but watch and see what happens by the time this project gets off the ground.

All of this nonsense right now is posturing.

Thanks Nancy...useful info.

My impression was that the life expectancy issue was raised by the architects as well.

Last month I talked to a couple of architects I am acquainted with and posed the question to them. They tell me that life-expectancy variables are commonly calculated into commercial construction. They shared the notion that most municipalities prefer to build longevity into their infrastructure. It is a better long-term value.

School buildings are a good example of that.

On the other hand a commercial developer might have a different vision for a property a couple of decades out and they'll not want to spend the money on a property destined for the wrecking ball in 20-30 years anyway.

My only observation about the parking was that the initial intent was to put the parking underground so as to make best use of the building footprint and allow the old building site to be utilized for alternative development. Without the underground parking the old building site will be used for surface parking, correct? I'm not sure that is the best use.

As for the old building, not only is it incapable of accomodating modern fire fighting apparatus, it has numerous other flaws and short-comings, not the least of which are structural deficiencies. It is failing.

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Duct tape is like the force. It has a light side, a dark side, and it holds the world together

Tine, Whitman was the original west High School. It became the middle school after the current West High was built. For a period of time the city then had three junior high schools. When West was initially built, the feeder schools for Longfellow were McKinley, Roosevelt, Lincoln and Washington. The feeder schools for Hawthorne originally were Underwood, Fisher, Webster, Wilson and Jefferson.

When the new West High building was completed, the old building became Whitman Junior High. Its feeder schools were Underwood, Fisher. Webster, Eisenhower and Madison. The feeder schools for Hawthorne were Wilson and Jefferson. The feeder schools for Longfellow remained the same.

When the original West was built, it was the period of extreme growth on the west side of Wauwatosa and also the period when the baby boom was entering their secondary school years. Yes the building was built quickly because Wauwatosa High School was experiencing severe crowding. When I was there the school held grades 10-12 and had almost 2000 students. The footprint of the school then was much smaller. Its back entrance was on 75th street. If you go into the current school the original building was west of the current school office and commons area. Yes the third floor was used for classrooms-mostly sciences and foreign language with speech in the tower. It was always interesting to walk in the corridor on the south east side of the third floor because it would sway as the students were walking between classes-the old gymnasium was below.
One also has to understand that at the time the final approval for the school district budget and any school capital expenditures were made by the city's common council. Many political games were played by the common council when dealing with those school expenditures. I cannot say for sure what occurred when the capital expenditure plans and budget were presented to the common council for the original West high school. I am quite confident that what was proposed and what was approved were vastly dissimilar based on my experiences with the common council and its approval of the school budgets in the 1970"s and early 1980's.

It was obvious almost immediately that the original building was not going to meet the needs of the community and the planning for the new school was begun-the opening was delayed because of a fire that occurred just prior to the original opening school year. It is easy to pick on the flaws in the Whitman building but one should remember that the high schools that were being built at the time did not have auditoriums like the one at East. Neither of the Elmbrook high schools which were built in the same time period had auditoriums.

The original building of the current East property also had compromises made to it when it was built. There is an open area in the center of the building. It was going to be where the swimming pool was to exist. The school did not have a swimming pool until the addition was completed. Until the addition was completed, the swim teams for the high school would go over to Hawthorne. It had a fabulous swimming pool area complete with permanent bleachers that were used for meets.

My original point was not to build it cheap but was one of questioning the need for underground parking.There has been some discussion about surface parking hindering use in the future if the trucks became larger. If the trucks become much larger I would think that there are other problems such as the ability to navigate the streets in the older section of the city.
However, eliminating the underground parking would not seem to alter the footprint of the building and would not seem to change the architect's plans to accommodate increases in equipment size. Thus I am still not persuaded that it would impact the useful life of the building. If more area would be needed for surface parking, there is still the land that is currently owned by one of the churches and is currently a surface parking lot. But that is another discussion.

This is interesting. Read the minutes covering the 1-2-08 Committee of the Whole - paticularly page 3 and Alderman Donegan.

Ald. Donegan spoke of responsibility to constituents and his need to be confident that the proposal has
been done correctly.

Chief Redman explained how decisions have evolved; one decision drives the next. Throughout the 18 months of
committee discussions, he has maintained the goals of operational capability in the long term and a strong desire for
continuity of operations during construction. Not having to move out of the station if using the north site was a
significant decision point, even though that meant they wouldn’t have optimum apparatus bay depth. In order to
accommodate the underground parking that Ald. Donegan advocated, it was necessary to reorient the
administrative portion to the north. They also felt it was extremely important to have public parking available next
to the administrative area. They believe not having longer bays will affect long-term operational capability, but it
allows for the underground parking and for operation during construction. Eliminating underground parking, which
would save 8% of the cost, changes the whole configuration and probably provides a better option to position
administrative offices on the south end and bays on the north end. Zimmerman applied all of those factors that
staff considered at each step. It has been necessary to move forward with decisions in order to get something
with which to work—they couldn’t come back with four or five different layouts.

So, first Donegan wants the underground parking and later Donegan backs out?

Since Donegan holds me in such high regard it will be interesting to see if I get an answer.

Check-in here periodically to see if he can explain himself.

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Duct tape is like the force. It has a light side, a dark side, and it holds the world together