Education is key.
Bradenton Beach city commissioners reached consensus July 1 to gather information on options for municipal buildings, aiming to educate residents on the problems and possible solutions they face in dealing with the city’s aging buildings.
Commissioners had debated posing a question to voters in the November election asking for support to sell or rebuild city hall, the Tingley Memorial Library and the police and public works buildings.
But the board decided instead to focus on educating residents on the status of city buildings.
City hall is a one-story building that faces the Gulf of Mexico at 107 Gulf Drive. Tingley Memorial Library is an elevated building behind city hall and the Bradenton Beach police and public works buildings are off Highland Avenue.
“They don’t see beyond the paint. They don’t look underneath anything,” Commissioner Marilyn Maro said July 1, referring to residents who don’t want to see municipal buildings change. “They have to see more than what they’re seeing.”
There is evidence of spalling concrete from exposure to salt air at city hall, public works director Tom Woodard said.
Woodard compared city hall’s spalling concrete to the building that collapsed June 24 in Surfside, saying, “What happened to that building is what we’re seeing in this building.”
He said the city’s buildings had been patched and repaired many times and the public works building, built in 1970, has termite damage.
The estimated cost to evaluate the buildings is about $15,000-$20,000, Woodard said, and repairs would be costly.
“I don’t need an engineer to tell me this building is falling apart,” he said, referring to city hall.
Commissioners plan to hire a firm to provide options for city buildings and distribute information to the public.
Commissioners also plan to hold public meetings to discuss building options and they may ask voters to weigh in on the November 2022 ballot.
Mayor John Chappie, Woodard and Gilbert plan to bring options to a commission meeting in September or October.