Dayton City Manager Shelley Dickstein said the city is trying to reposition the building for redevelopment while addressing safety issues.
Combative exchanges occurred during contract discussions, including between Dayton Mayor Jeffrey Mims Jr. and city Commissioner Shenise Turner-Sloss, who are both running for the mayor’s seat this November.
Turner-Sloss accused Mims of being very disrespectful and preventing her from asking important questions about the contract, while the mayor accused her of speaking out of turn.
Contract for North Main building
Earlier this month, three of the five members of the Dayton City Commission voted in favor of amending a contract with A.H. Sturgill Roofing for emergency work on the 14-story building on North Main Street.
The original service agreement, approved in June, provided about $1.6 million in funding; the amendment increased the amount to nearly $3 million.
The city commission in April also approved amending an agreement with Bladecutter’s Inc. to provide about $1.95 million to help with emergency stabilization, debris removal and demolition work for the damaged structure.
Part of the office tower’s parapet detached and fell down on March 15 during windy weather. Falling materials also damaged Stratacache Tower next door.
A memo from Steve Gondol, Dayton’s director of planning, neighborhoods and development, says that the additional funding to A.H. Sturgill will help pay for shoring, weatherproofing, scaffolding, debris handling, controlled removals and other emergency costs to both protect the public and the building until it can be fully rehabilitated by a developer.
City Manager Dickstein said the city expects to issue a request for proposals soon to try to find a firm to redevelop the long vacant office building.
“This is a significant building of significant scale on our Main Street corridor that doesn’t exist anywhere else in the region,” she said. “It is very similar to the strategies that we’ve done with the (Dayton) Arcade, the strategies we’ve done with Center City (building).”
The discussion on the dais between commission members about the contract amendment was tense at times.
Commissioner Fairchild questioned why the city commission was asked to authorize $1.4 million in additional spending for what did not appear to be new work items. He asked for the commission to table a vote on the contract until the scope of the work was clarified.
Fairchild said city officials should have made it clear to the commission in June if additional funding would be required to get the emergency and stabilization work completed.
Dickstein said the city did not know right away the extent of the necessary work. She said the city also needed time to figure out how to pay for emergency repairs.
Commissioner Turner-Sloss also said she was concerned about how much funding the city is putting into a building that has an uncertain future when money is tight and there are many other community needs.
When Turner-Sloss tried to ask director Gondol a question at last week’s commission meeting, Mayor Mims cut her off, saying she already had her chance to speak.
Mims said commission members had the contract documents for days, and members with questions should have brought them up to the city manager or staff before the meeting.
Commissioners should not “give the appearance to staff or to whoever is watching these meetings that staff is doing something wrong and you’re leading us down the wrong path or that we’re misspending money,” Mims said. “That is not the perception we want to give.”
Turner-Sloss took offense to the these comments, replying, “That is very disrespectful and insecure for you to even make that comment.”
Turner-Sloss said commission members are supposed to ask questions, and doing so in no way reflects a lack of trust or confidence in city staff.
“Let the record show that the mayor once again is being irresponsible in his role as the presiding (member) to suggest we can’t pose any questions,” Turner-Sloss said.
Mims and commissioners Chris Shaw and Matt Joseph voted to approve the contract amendment. Fairchild and Turner-Sloss abstained from voting.
Turner-Sloss this week said that she chose to abstain because more discussion was called for but did not occur.
“As elected officials, we are responsible for acting as prudent fiscal stewards on behalf of Dayton taxpayers,” she said. “Public deliberation is essential, fostering a civil and transparent environment that promotes accountability. Any attempt to impede transparency poses a risk to democracy and erodes the public trust that we are sworn to uphold.”
Commissioner Joseph during the meeting said the city commission by “tradition and courtesy” sends questions to the city manager days before the weekly meetings to allow her time to try to get answers, especially if the questions are complex.
“For things like this, where people’s livelihoods are at stake, the stability of the building is at stake, we need to make sure we’re ready to vote on Wednesday,” Joseph said. “The act of bringing up something of a surprise on Wednesday is more a political act than like a policy act.”
Joseph said the North Main Street office tower has great redevelopment potential, but the city’s investments are the only clear way to get the property on the path to revitalization.
“There’s nobody else that’s going to do it,” he said. “The alternative is to let it rot and start hitting other buildings around it or spend a whole lot of money to take it down when that’s not a really good option.”
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