Gorham voters could be asked in November if the town should spend $5.75 million to turn the former Little Falls School into a police station and renovate the public safety building.
The Town Council will vote Tuesday on whether to add the question to the ballot for the Nov. 6 election.
The police and fire departments currently share a building on Main Street, but the need for more space was first identified in a facilities study done in 1999, said Town Manager David Cole.
The town looked at different options, including whether to build a fire station in the old Little Falls School on Acorn Street. The school hasn’t housed students for about a decade but is used as a community center. It would have cost about $8.7 million, and the town’s efforts to get a federal grant to help pay for it failed.
In February, the council asked PDT Architects of Portland, which had worked on previous renditions of the project, to look at turning the former school into a police station.
Cole said the firm found that plan would be less expensive than building a fire station there.
The police and fire departments both need more space.
The police department, Cole said, needs more space to store evidence, and officers need more room to conduct laboratory work.
Fire Chief Robert Lefebvre said his department needs separate bunk rooms, locker rooms and bathrooms for men and women, who now share those spaces. He said the women lock the door to those rooms when they’re using them.
He’d also like a separate room for training, which now happens in the kitchen and eating area.
The department is also in need of more bays, Lefebvre said. Some of its non-emergency vehicles have to be kept outside.
Lefebvre said it wouldn’t make a difference to him whether the police or fire department moves into the old Little Falls School.
“Either way it meets the needs of both departments,” he said.
Councilor Philip Gagnon said Wednesday he had not yet seen plans for the project and would have to hear the presentation on it Tuesday before deciding whether to ask residents if they want to pay for it.
Not knowing the question was coming before the council, Gagnon had been looking at costs for renovations to the public safety building, to accommodate the space needs, and to the old Little Falls School, so it could continue to be used as a community center.
If the council decides Tuesday not to hold a referendum on the $5.7 million project, it will then vote on whether to ask residents in November if they want to spend $750,000 on the public safety building and $500,000 on the community center to do those renovations.
“I’m about giving people a choice,” Gagnon said.
The meeting Tuesday starts at 7 p.m. in the Municipal Center. Gagnon said that if very few people show up to the meeting, he’d like to wait until September to vote on the project.
Staff Writer Leslie Bridgers can be contacted at: 791-6364 or at
lbridgers@pressherald.com
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