Star City hires design team for rec center project

PRESQUE ISLE – With a team of companies on board to design a proposed community center, city officials will know by the end of August how big it will be, how much it will cost and what it will look like.

The City Council voted Monday night to spend $15,000 for design services from architectural firm Design Group Collaborative of Ellsworth and Portland-based engineering firm Woodard and Curran.

The companies have 90 days to complete preliminary designs and conceptual drawings of the building, which would replace the aging William V. Haskell Community Center. Last fall, the city created the Community Center Committee to research costs and options for replacing the building.

The committee believes a new building needs to include a senior center with a kitchen, a teen center, a full-size gym with adequate spectator seating, and a multipurpose room for everything from aerobics to arts and crafts.

They hope to locate the building in a spot with room for a recreation complex, which could include an outdoor pool, playing courts or ball fields. Right now, four sites are under consideration: property south of Mantle Lake Park, a parking area on Riverside Drive, property near the University of Maine at Presque Isle and the Fairview Acres property on Parsons Street.

Chris Beaulieu, the city’s recreation and parks director, said Tuesday that the committee hopes to have a site selected before the drawings are done.

“One of the most important things is that we have the right site,” Beaulieu said. “Obviously, we want to make the best choice for the city.”

Officials have not determined the building’s size, though they have said it will be at least double the existing 7,200-square-foot center. The cost, too, is unknown, though city councilors indicated it would be several million dollars.

Kevin Sipe, committee chairman, said Tuesday that officials are not making ballpark estimates because the design work needs to be done before size and cost figures are known.

“When the architect is done and they give us a figure, that’s the point when the tires hit the road,” Sipe said. “We’ll have a clear vision of what the building will look like and a clear vision of projected costs. Anything else at this point would be speculative.”

The nine-member committee and company officials plan to meet on June 7 to discuss what the building needs to include. Based on that, Sipe said, officials will be able to determine how big the building will have to be and whether it will fit on the site selected. Then, they will do preliminary designs and give rough cost estimates.

Sipe said that by the time the municipal budget season rolls around this fall, the committee hopes to present the council with a selected site, preliminary designs, floor plans, conceptual drawings, preliminary cost estimates and funding options. The council then would decide where to progress from there.

As the process moves forward, Beaulieu said the committee is keeping one thought at the forefront:

“We’re just trying to get what we feel this community really needs, a good place for our members – our youth and our seniors,” he said. “We think we really have a need here, and we’re trying to stay focused with that and we’re doing what we need to do to make it happen.”