Thursday, April 25, 2024
After five previous unsuccessful attempts, the City of Gatesville has been selected to receive more than $180,000 in grant funding to abate and remove the former Rotunda Nursing Home building.
The Environmental Protection Agency-backed Brownfield Cleanup Grant is an 80/20 local match grant that is being funded as a cleanup grant to remediate the Rotunda site.
The Rotunda, located at 2525 Osage Road, ceased operations in 2000 and has sat vacant and in increasing disrepair since. The city acquired the property in 2008 through tax foreclosure.
Because the Rotunda building is laden with asbestos in its walls, floors and ceiling tiles, demolition is not an option without proper abatement to first remove the asbestos, a cost-prohibitive task for the city to complete without assistance.
The presence of asbestos qualified the site for eligibility for the EPA Brownfields Program, which funds selected applications at an 80/20 cost-share with a community.
The 80-percent funds granted by the EPA total $183, 409.
The 20 percent local cost share from the city could come from services instead of funding, City Manager Bill Parry said.
City officials applied for the cleanup grant funding in 2010, 2011, 2012, 2019, 2020 and this year.
Parry noted that the 2020 application came “very, very close,” to acceptance, so this year’s effort was emboldened by the city’s contracting with a consultant and a series of town halls that brought the community’s input into the submitted packet.
The approval of the grant funding could mean more than clearing a residential neighborhood of an eyesore, as the City already has a plan for the site.
Abating and removing the Rotunda site will not only eliminate a decaying eyesore in a residential neighborhood, but could also provide the site for a new police station and City Hall.
“We had the perfect City-owned site picked out to replace our 61-year-old police station and 83-year-old City Hall; our challenge was finding a feasible way to get rid of an abandoned, asbestos-laden blighted nursing home that was on the site.,” Gatesville Mayor Gary Chumley said. “This Brownfields Cleanup Grant will help us do that – abate and remove a habitual eyesore without placing that burden on our taxpayers’ backs. We look forward to partnering with the EPA and Region 6 in turning the page on this long-standing problem.”
Removing the crumbling Rotunda has been a long-standing goal for Gatesville leaders.
The City acquired the Rotunda site in December 2008 at a tax foreclosure sale. In 2009, the City was informed that the state would not allow the city to abate the asbestos because the abatement would have to be completed by a certified contractor. Budget constraints at the time put the abatement on hold, Parry said.
For the following three years, Gatesville city leaders applied for the Brownfields Cleanup Grant funding and were denied each time.
In 2014 and 2015, city funds were used to abate the asbestos in two wings and abolish those wings, but there were not enough resources to complete the abatement and demolition in the remainder of the building.
Gatesville leaders applied for the Cleanup Grant again in 2019 and 2020; finally receiving approval for funding this year.
There are still several steps the city must complete before removing the Rotunda.
“We are very, very early in the process,” Parry said, adding that there should be no expectation that the building will be gone tomorrow. “There are several preliminary steps we must follow and every step must be approved by the EPA.”
The EPA will appoint a program manager to work with the city on meeting the EPA’s requirements and finalize the plan in detail and budget for the final plan.
The City will need to issue a Request for Proposal to procure a Qualified Environmental Professional who will finalize the draft plan the city submitted to the EPA, oversee the activities of the selected contractors and provide all required reported in the Department of Stet Health Services, Parry said.
The City will also issue Requests for Proposals to selected the abatement/demolition contractor who will complete abatement, demolition and disposal.
The ideal plan involves a wet demolition of the building and off-site disposal of the materials, Parry said.
The City Manager cautioned that the process will be an extended one and he expects the project to take up to two years to complete.
“Because this involves federal grant funding, the City will be required to procure all goods and services in accordance with the Federal Acquisition Regulation to ensure appropriate use of taxpayer funding; that is a detailed and lengthy process,” Parry said. “I like to consider the grant award to be the ‘end of the beginning’ as opposed to the beginning of the end. While it will take some time, it will be done right, the public will not be exposed to health hazards, and this blighted eyesore will finally be addressed.
