Clear Lake City Hall remodeling project to get underway this fall

CLEAR LAKE — A remodeling project for Clear Lake City Hall is scheduled to get underway later this fall. The City Council allocated $1 million in this year’s budget to undertake a significant security upgrade and remodeling project for the administrative side of the City Hall building. City staff has been working with Bergland & Cram Architects of Mason City on the proposed design.

Mayor Nelson Crabb says the security upgrade is long overdue.  “We’re pretty wide open here now, and I do believe the COVID pandemic really opened our eyes up to how secure we really do want this particular building to be for our employees who are here.”

Crabb says the administrative side of City Hall will temporarily move to another location during the project.  “We hope to relocate to Pritchards Innovation Center, the old former TQ Technology building out on 4th Avenue South. We’ll probably be there for a six to ten month period, time will tell on that one. The council will approve a lease with Pritchards Innovation Center personnel, and we hope to have it complete sometime late May into June.”

Crabb says moving temporarily to another location will help speed up the renovation process.   “By moving City Hall temporarily out there, that’s an advantage with regard to the renovation. Probably if people were here, they would have to be phased in over certain parts of it that would be renovated. This way, there doesn’t need to be any phasing so to speak in the project. They can just come in, get their thing and do it, and perhaps that will hurry up the time that we’ll need to spend out in the old TQ Technology area of the Pritchard Innovation Center.”

The City Council chambers will remain unaffected by the proposed project, minus some simple technology upgrades, and the municipal election in November and large city staff meetings would still be held in that location. It’s anticipated that the project would be bid in September, with construction starting in October.

Crabb made his comments during the recent edition of the “Ask the Mayor” program on AM-1300 KGLO. Listen back to that program by heading to the “Ask the Mayor” archive section at kglonews.com.