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The Dispatch/Maryland Coast Dispatch
November 29, 2013
Council Seeks Tweaks To New OCBP Home Design
By JOANNE SHRINER
STAFF WRITER
OCEAN CITY – The new Ocean City Beach Patrol (OCBP) headquarters’ preliminary design was presented on Tuesday afternoon with Mayor and Council requesting a few minor tweaks before approval. The new OCBP home was presented as a three-story building with the entrance facing the corner of Talbot Street and Philadelphia Avenue. The building represents a traditional Ocean City aesthetic as laid out by Ocean City Development Corporation’s (OCDC) Downtown Design Standards. In August, the Mayor and City Council voted to add the construction of a new OCBP facility to a bond issuance that will go to the market by the end of the year. The facility has a maximum price tag of $2 million. Prior to the council’s approval this year, the project had been left on the drawing board for some time. The OCBP currently occupies three buildings on Dorchester Street that were formerly used to serve as the old Ocean City Police Department and District Court facilities. In 1993, the buildings were deemed unsuitable for the OCPD and District Court and they vacated the
A rendering of the proposed design for the new Ocean City Beach Patrol headquarters downtown is shown. Rendering by Becker Morgan
property moving into the new Public Safety Building on 65th Street. The dilapidating facility was never meant to be a permanent home for the beach patrol. Examination of the existing buildings revealed significant issues, such as numerous ADA violations, nonfunctioning sprinkler systems, asbestos siding, cracks in exterior masonry walls and all buildings’ first floors are below the FEMA Base Flood Elevation. OCDC and city staff had recommended the new headquarters be located across the street from its
existing location on three parcels purchased by the OCDC between Talbot and Dorchester streets that currently stands as a gravel parking lot next to OCDC’s office. The council accepted OCDC’s proposal of a land swamp of OCDC parking lots in the Dorchester/Talbot streets block for the city-owned lots where the existing headquarters stands in the Dorchester/Somerset streets block. Once the existing facility is demolished, those lots will then become temporary parking lots instead. In addition, the OCDC will pay 35
percent of the cost of the new OCBP building and site improvements over the 20-year bond life, not to exceed $2 million. These assisted funds would come from the Inlet Parking Lot fund, which is a dedicated funding source established a decade ago to fund downtown revitalization projects by OCDC. City Engineer Terry McGean this week presented the facility’s conceptual design, which was created by Becker Morgan Group. “Quite a bit of effort has gone into this on a staff level in meeting with the architect. The first design goaround we had 3,000 square feet larger than what we’re showing now, so there was quite a bit of an effort to get it down to where it needed to be,” McGean said. The first floor will enter into a lobby that will serve as a directory toward the second and third floors with access to a stair tower and elevator. There is an outdoor entrance to a second stair tower on the opposite side of the building. The majority of the first floor serves as OCPD bicycle storage, which the current facility is also used for, as well as a restroom and office space for OCPD’s bike patrol division. Also a garage for OCBP vehicles, such as ATVs and Jet Skis, and a workshop are included. SEE NEXT PAGE
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