TRURO — Three months before town meeting, the effort to replace Truro’s Dept. of Public Works (DPW) facility is gaining momentum. The ad hoc building committee, tasked with recommending a design, is pushing forward with a tight timeline approved by the select board.
At its Jan. 28 meeting, the select board voted unanimously to adopt a schedule requested by DPW Director Jarrod Cabral. Cabral and Assistant Town Manager Kelly Clark are set to present final recommendations for funding and a warrant article at the board’s Feb. 25 meeting, with a backup discussion date of March 11.
The board chose not to allocate $12,500 for a phase I environmental analysis at 340 Route 6, which means any proposed design on the May 3 town meeting warrant would be focused on the Town Hall Hill site. Chair Sue Areson and members Nancy Medoff and Sue Girard-Irwin all said they were not ready to pursue the Route 6 site analysis.
“I supported concurrent tracks up to a point,” said Medoff. “We reached that point on Dec. 10 when Paul Millett of Environmental Partners indicated Town Hall Hill was buildable.”
Areson, who had said on Jan. 14 that she might support funding the Route 6 site analysis, said she had changed her mind. “Ethically, at some point we have to do a phase I, and if necessary, a phase II at that site,” she said. “I just don’t think we’re there yet.”
Member Bob Weinstein disagreed. “I think they’re ill-informed, and they’re following rather than leading,” said Weinstein, who has long favored the Route 6 site. “I think it would be foolish at this point not to go forward.”
Town Manager Darrin Tangeman warned that delaying the phase I analysis might lead to setbacks. “We don’t have an appropriation for phase II if we don’t do a phase I,” he said. “My concern is if something happens and this site isn’t viable, we have to wait another year, or we have to have a special town meeting to get funds.”
Tangeman added that funds would be available through the end of the fiscal year should the board decide to revisit the discussion.
Environmental concerns loom over the current DPW site at Town Hall Hill, where the phase II environmental analysis turned up PFAS contamination. Cabral told the select board on Jan. 14 that remediation, including capping an approximately 35-foot-wide section that extends from his office to the fence and west corner of the site, would cost about $2 million and must be completed within five years.
The town will spend $250,000 before July 1 on testing and reports to the Mass. Dept. of Environmental Protection. Cabral added that HRP Associates had recommended budgeting $200,000 annually for five years to cover quarterly reporting, monitoring, and the potential installation of water filtration systems for the 22 households near the current DPW. The town began testing at least eight of them for PFAS this month.
Design Concepts Emerge
At the ad hoc building committee meeting on Jan. 16, member Anthony Garrett presented two revised concepts from the DPW Study Group. Both designs showed a campus layout at Town Hall Hill, which Garrett said helped to maximize space usage and repurpose existing components like the maintenance shop and fuel island.
The first option, referred to as the “Chevy Blazer Version,” proposed a stripped-down 17,500-square-foot campus with three buildings for administration, maintenance, and vehicle service and storage, including a solar canopy. The salt shed was eliminated in this version.
“This is the leanest version we could see working at this site,” said Garrett; he did not provide a cost estimate.
The second option, the “Chevy Traverse Scheme,” includes 21,500 square feet with larger buildings, a salt shed, and an extended solar canopy.
Garrett noted that the designs were conceptual and could evolve.
Tangeman expressed reservations about the location of the wash bay and the suggestion to exclude a salt shed. He also said that the study group’s 2023 “inaccurate cost estimate” for a “$15.33-million design” had negatively influenced voter expectations about project costs.
“The voters didn’t have accurate information,” said Tangeman. “We should have vetted it.”
Tangeman pointed to an estimate that any DPW facility would cost approximately $28 million. Garrett disagreed, saying that the overall cost the study group presented was actually $16.5 million. Tangeman said he supported the idea of Garrett vetting out the cost differentials with the owner’s project manager (OPM).
Division Over Design
Discussion of Garrett’s designs divided the ad hoc building committee. Co-chair Michael Cohen said he favored a single-building design, emphasizing operational efficiency, safety, and staff morale. “When you have everything under one roof, it works,” he said.
Alternate member Bob Panessiti shared Cohen’s preference for a single-building design and questioned the DPW Study Group’s involvement, seconding Tangeman’s concerns about misleading voters.
“While things may be conceptual, once members of the community hear things, they don’t hear ‘conceptual,’ ” said Panessiti. “They assume it’s stated fact, and that creates all kinds of issues.”
Member Leif Hamnquist also leaned toward a single-building design, citing the DPW’s operational efficiency. “It wrenches my gut because design-wise, I think it’s wholly inappropriate for that site,” he said.
Member Anastasia Song advocated a compromise that incorporated aspects of Garrett’s campus plan while addressing the needs of DPW staff and taxpayers.
Cabral suggested that scaling back the DPW facility’s garage bay could be a way to reduce costs, based on discussions with the OPM. “If that’s what we’re targeting, to go from $28 million down a little bit, we’re going to have to make cuts from 21,150 square feet down,” Cabral said.
Co-chair Bob Higgins-Steele said he preferred a single-building design but wanted the OPM to provide cost estimates for both the campus plan and a single-building option before the committee made a final decision. “I’m very sensitive to the voters and there’s so much good stuff in this plan,” said Higgins-Steele, referring to Garrett’s second design.
“I want to make sure that, in the end, we have the spaces accounted for that we had formally identified as the minimum to make this an effective DPW,” he said.
“The select board wants something they can take to the town that will pass,” added Girard-Irwin, the select board’s liaison to the committee.
The ad hoc building committee, which will now meet weekly instead of biweekly, will review cost estimates for both designs at its Jan. 30 meeting and vote on which layout to pursue.
