By KEVIN NEVERS

It could cost anything between $730,000 and $1.26 million—or it might cost even more—to renovate the old United Tractor facility at 116 N. 15th St. and make it habitable and functional enough to transact the Town of Chesterton’s municipal business there.

More than a year ago, on April 7, 2005, the Chesterton Utility closed the purchase of the property. The price: $375,000. The idea behind the purchase: to use the 28,732-square foot building on a 2.95-acre site for the storage of equipment as well as the headquartering of the town’s engineering, stormwater management, and economic development functions.

Fifteen months later, however, the building remains unoccupied, after it became clear that the renovations needed to make it serviceable—gutting rooms, adding fire walls, erecting partitions—were beyond the Utility’s ability to do mostly in-house. Meanwhile, Clerk-Treasurer Gayle Polakowski and her staff at the town hall are rapidly running out of room for records and archives, to the point that a temporary space had to be constructed this spring in the southeast corner of the meeting room just to alleviate some of the overspill.

So in March Member Sharon Darnell, D-4th, impressed upon her colleagues the need to get the 15th Street property “on line and in operation,” even if it means bonding for improvements and repaying the issue with CEDIT funds.

Nudged by Darnell, the council accordingly instructed department heads to formulate a plan for the renovation of the facility, and the preliminary fruits of that plan were unveiled at a special meeting of the council Monday night, as two architectural firms, DLZ of South Bend and Pollack Architectural Group of Valparaiso, pitched their proposals for the project.

Both firms proposed gutting the interior and demolishing the exterior facade, partitioning the interior with plenty of office and storage space, upgrading or replacing the HVAC, adding new restrooms, and giving the whole a municipal—as opposed to manufacturing—look.

DLZ’s estimated project cost: $1.26 million. Pollack’s: $630,000 to $730,000.

For an additional cost—DLZ estimated it at $240,000, Pollack at $84,900 to $99,900—the firms would renovate the meeting room in the town hall as well.

The firms’ total estimated cost for both the 15th Street property and the meeting room: DLZ put it at $1.25 million to $1.75 million; Pollack, at $714,000 to $829,900.

The council voted 5-0 to take both proposals under advisement but it did have a few questions. In particular Member Mike Bannon, R-5th, wanted to know the biggest design challenges posed by the old United Tractor facility.

“You’re essentially starting from scratch,” Jason Vetne of DLZ replied. Electrical, plumbing, and HVAC all need to be replaced or significantly upgraded. Some of the existing roof could be preserved, he added, but it would have to be re-skinned. And the problem of “occupancy” makes everything more difficult: putting office space side-by-side with equipment storage would raise code issues and require rated fire separation.

Ken Pollack of Pollack Architectural Group said much the same thing. The old United Tractor facility is a “pre-engineered building,” basically “a throw-away building,” “a difficult building to make look good.”

Member Sharon Darnell, D-4th, did note that, if pursued, the renovation would be done with a view to the town’s needs—or as the case may be, to the city’s needs—10 or 12 years into the future. “That’s the reason rooms are labeled for things that don’t exist,” she said, like the Office of Mayor or the Office of Town Manager.

Bannon gave another example. Remodeling the meeting room in the town hall is certainly a possibility, but then both architectural firms proposed partitioning a large meeting room space at the 15th Street property. Perhaps the council and the other boards could one day hold their meetings there and let the Chesterton Police Department, currently cramped into a tiny corner of 726 Broadway, expand into that space. “I’d hate to spend a lot of money remodeling this room when five years later we’re going to do something else,” he said.

Or, as Member Jim Ton, R-1st, remarked, “Why build two meeting rooms when everybody can meet in one. . . . We need to look at our long-term needs as a community.”

Still, how exactly the town would pay for the project remains to be seen. “A lot is up in the air in terms of our funding levels,” Bannon said.

Posted 6/27/2006