WESTFIELD – The City Council Thursday night approved an appropriation of $300,000 from the city’s stabilization fund, which required nine affirmative votes, for the initial Senior Center design.
Ward 5 Councilor Richard E. Onofrey Jr., the chairman of the Finance Committee, said that the original concept was to finance all of the “soft costs’ of the project from the $7 million bond that Mayor Daniel M. Knapik will submit to the City Council.
Those soft costs include design and construction administration costs when the center is eventually built on the former estate of Mary Noble.
The Finance Committee met with City Purchaser Tammy Tefft to discuss the $300,000 appropriation prior to the full council meeting. The current approach is to reserve as much of the $7 million bond funds for construction as possible.
The current design is for a 19,000 square-foot structure which can be expanded in the future. During the City Council meeting Tefft said that construction of senior centers is more expensive than that for commercial buildings and designing a building that can be expanded at a later date, as needed, to service the growing senior population of the city increases the design costs.
Onofrey said that there will be additional requests for design funding with an estimate of a total design cost of between $900,000 and $1 million, money from stabilization or the city’s free cash account after those funds are certified by the state Department of Revenue.
Council on Aging Director Tina Gorman said recently that the function of senior centers has changed substantially over the past four decades since communities began to build senior centers when the original intent was to provide meals and a place for social interaction.
The centers are now the hub of social service programs targeting the growing senior population, providing a range of services, from financial coaching, tax return preparation and fuel assistance to wellness programs. The new center will also house the city’s veteran services office.
The building design must be flexible to provide for both present and future services. Westfield presently has a senior population of 8,000 residents.
The council voted 12-1 to approve the funding request from stabilization, with Ward 2 Councilor Brian Winters casting the only dissenting vote. The $300,000 will finance the building design up to the 25 percent design phase.
The design challenge is to limit the footprint of the structure to preserve as much space on the site for parking with a goal of providing at least 120 parking spaces at the Noble Street facility, yet provide sufficient area to support all of the services provided through the Council on Aging programming.
