It was whipflash.
The Ocean City administration rushed a resolution before Ocean City Council Sept. 24 to buy the former Crown Bank building and two parking lots for $12.6 million. The prospect was to make the old high-rise at 801 Asbury Ave. into the new police station.
The city was already planning to renovate and expand the current police department and municipal court building on Central Avenue, which is in an even older building.
Council approved it on first reading, setting up second reading and a public hearing for this week. That now appears moot even though it remains on the agenda for Thursday evening’s meeting.
The purchase ordinance was a rush job.
The administration wanted council to weigh in quickly because the city was trying to avoid the state’s new “mansion tax” that could have added some $400,000 to the price tag.
It was placed on council’s agenda even though the due diligence on the century-old building wasn’t complete.
The administration promised council “most” of that due diligence to assess the condition of the building would be finished before they had to vote again.
Then, five days later on Tuesday afternoon, a joint announcement by Mayor Jay Gillian and Council President Terry Crowley Jr. said there was no longer the desire to buy the building.
That was quick.
The city has budgeted some $30 million for the new police station at 835 Central Ave. The consideration of the Crown Bank building was a means to potentially save money, but we don’t know how quickly that would have been determined.
This newspaper’s staff was a former tenant of the building for just over a decade after Hurricane Sandy caused too much damage to our former home on Eighth Street in late 2012. We were there for two owners before the third and current owner asked us and other tenants to vacate. (The Sentinel is now happily ensconced at 218 West Ave.)
There were some positives to being in the Crown Bank building since we no longer needed our presses to print the newspaper, but there were also downsides, including a hinky elevator that was out of service for about a year.
We’re not structural engineers so we could not say the building was neither sound nor able to accommodate the police station, but we did wonder why the city has to keep bouncing back and forth on plans for a new home for the department.
Finding a home for the OCPD has been bandied about for decades in Ocean City because the current home is woefully outdated and inadequate.
However, it appeared the city finally settled on the plan to renovate and expand 835 Central after council rejected as problematic and too costly building a $42 million joint police and fire headquarters at Fifth Street between West and Asbury avenues.
The city already enacted part of its modernization plan. The construction is nearing completion on the police substation at Eighth Street and Boardwalk, which should be open later this fall.
We hope the administration is forthcoming about the plans for 835 Central and what it decided about 801 Asbury.
Are there worries the renovation and expansion is going to cost more than the projected $30 million? Is that why they were considering Crown Bank as an alternative? Have some potential problems been uncovered at both places?
We hope this gets clarified Thursday evening at the City Council meeting. We hope the administration explains its decision to back off the purchase at 801 Asbury and move forward at 835 Central.
The public deserves the answers.
