The Edmond Sun

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November 5, 2008

City, opposition look at what's next for Public Safety Center

James Coburn

EDMOND — Edmond Mayor Dan O’Neil began exploring how to best fund the proposed $31.5 million Public Safety Center Wednesday morning after voters rejected the ad valorem proposition supported by the City Council.

“We’re looking at all our options and trying to see what works,” O’Neil said.

The Public Safety Center would facilitate the Edmond Police Department, the Central Communications Department and the Emergency Management Department moving into one building.

The Edmond City Council voted unanimously in July to approve Barnett Field at Kelly and Main Street as the site for an 83,000-square-foot Public Safety Center.

City residents voted against the center 24,121 to 15,268. O’Neil said the community appears anxious to pursue the sales tax option.

“In a city of 75,000, that’s pretty close to an overwhelming response,” O’Neil said.

O’Neil sat down with longtime Edmond real estate broker Pete Reeser Wednesday morning to discuss the sales tax option for funding the facility. Reeser was an outspoken leader of The Committee to Stop Higher Property Taxes. He supports a half-cent sales tax to fund the Public Safety Center.

“There’s a number of options. We’ve asked them for some names. We’re going to set up a sounding board committee of people in the community that were opposed to it,” O’Neil said.

O’Neil said he asked Reeser for a list of names of people to appoint to an oversight committee.

“I’d be happy to work with him any way I can,” Reeser said. “If he wants me to help recruit some people, I’d be happy to.”

Perhaps former Mayor Randel Shadid had been the most outspoken member of the opposition group.

“… I recognize something is needed and I’d be happy to work on the project with them if asked,” he said.

And former City Councilman Barry Rice also said he’d be pleased to provide his input to the city.

“I’d be glad to put as much effort into making it work as I did to keep it from happening,” Rice said.

Reeser said the size of the proposed Public Safety Center should be scaled down to 60,000 square feet. A 2000 needs assessment study determined the current downtown police station’s 22,000-square-foot design is inadequate for Edmond’s population.

“There is a solution the community will support and I am confident that our elected officials will be able to work with the community to find that solution,” said Claudia Deakins, public information director for the City of Edmond.

Reeser said he is glad voters chose to save the ad valorem tax for Edmond Public Schools.

“We’ve always used it for the schools and it should stay that way,” Reeser said. “I’m in favor of the $36 million school bond issue on Dec. 9.”

O’Neil said the City Council was convinced it had given Edmond residents the most economical way of building the Public Safety Center.

Deakins said the police and emergency management departments made numerous presentations and talked to many residents during the campaign. Edmond residents who toured the police station overwhelmingly acknowledged the need for a new police facility, Deakins said.

Edmond Police Chief Bob Ricks said the Police Department is disappointed the Public Safety Center proposition did not pass.

“The need had not gone away,” Ricks said. “Every day we make decisions of arresting someone based on space in the jail.”

Ricks said the Police Department still lacks modern equipment to solve crimes properly.

“There is not proper space to treat victims of crime in Edmond,” he said. “A report room is used for a report writing room, a victim interview room, evidence processing, preparations room and the evidence submission room. This is because no other space is available. These conditions will only continue to get worse.”

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