OCEAN CITY – After addressing previous concerns, the latest design of the Ocean City Beach Patrol headquarters is on path to the full Mayor and City Council for final approval.
In late December, the Recreation and Parks Commission met with City Engineer Terry McGean, Ocean City Police Captain Kevin Kirstein, Ocean City Beach Patrol Lt. Ward Kovacs, Recreation and Parks Director Tom Shuster, OCDC Vice President Jay Knerr and Jack Mumford of Becker Morgan to discuss the design of the new downtown building.
A few weeks prior, McGean presented the design as a three-story building with the entrance facing the corner of Talbot Street and Philadelphia Avenue. The building represents a traditional Ocean City aesthetic as laid out by Ocean City Development Corporation’s Downtown Design Standards.
The first floor will enter into a lobby that will serve as a directory toward the second and third floors with access to a stair tower and elevator. There is an outdoor entrance to a second stair tower on the opposite side of the building.
The majority of the first floor will serve as police bicycle storage, which the current facility is also used for, as well as a restroom and office space for the bike patrol division. Also a garage for OCBP vehicles, such as ATVs and personal watercraft, and a work shop is included. A separate room is included on the first floor to store and dispense radios. A section is included for OCBP dry storage and office space.
The second floor includes a work room, office space, storage and male and female locker rooms, which is an improvement from the current facility that holds a restroom with one sink, one toilet and one shower for the entire OCBP.
The largest space on the second floor is a combined 1,100-square-foot classroom and multipurpose space to be used for training and/or physical activities. A partition wall was added to be able to divide the space if needed.
The third floor will serve as the administrative area and will enter into a receptionist area that is joined by the dispatch area.
A few council concerns that stalled the design involved the amount of covered porches and the associated costs, the lobby being too large without a receptionist area and the elevation of the first floor needing to be higher to avoid flooding.
During that December Recreation and Parks Commission meeting, Mumford presented alternative design plans. In all sketches, the garage was moved to face the south, giving vehicles direct access from the parking lot.
The fourth sketch was favored by the majority of the group. The bike patrol and OCBP areas were swapped, moving the OCBP area to the front of the building and the bike patrol to the southeast corner off Talbot Street. Although the space was rearranged, square footage remained about the same, except now an OCBP office is attached to the lobby for an employee to greet visitors.
Other sketches eliminated the exterior covered porch on the second level, which reduced the square footage of porches in half and added about 20 square feet to the work room, which saved about $40,000.
As of a result of the meeting, Becker Morgan was asked to tweak the design to include a window between the lobby and OCBP office on the first floor for an employee to assist and direct facility visitors as they enter the building, to raise the garage’s flood level from 5.5 feet to at least 6.5 feet to avoid expensive equipment from being damaged in case of a flood, which would mean spike the cost due to having to add retaining walls but make up for the additional cost by eliminating the covered wrap-around porches on the back side of the building, and only have covered porches on the face of the building.
This week the Recreation and Parks Commission reconvened to view the additional changes made by Becker Morgan.
Mumford stated the flood level of the garage has been raised to an elevation of 6.5 feet with the remainder of the building at an elevation 8 feet.
Mumford moved to the interior of the first floor showing the lobby space being minimized to give a more intimate feeling entering the building, as well as a connection, or window, was added between the lobby and beach patrol office.
The plan still includes the two upper floors each having a covered porch on the face of the building, which can be changed if the full Mayor and City Council decides to do so.
The commission voted unanimously to forward the design to the full council for approval.
“The only other thing I wanted to add is the last couple of buildings we have done we have done it as straight conventional designs, and the last one [Caroline Street Comfort Station] I think you will agree was a mixed success, so what I will be asking the council for is I would like to do this with a construction manager,” McGean said.
McGean has formed and released a Request for Proposal (RFP) for bid proposals to manage the construction project.
“I would like to bring on a construction manager soon,” McGean said. “I think it will help us get this done successfully.”
The commission was in consensus with McGean who will be bringing the request before the full council.
“I think that is the way to go,” Commission Chair Councilman Joe Mitrecic said.