Parking space to increase at auditorium

Parking at the Morgan City Municipal Auditorium is set to increase by about 160 spaces pending City Council approval as part of an agreement between the city and the Port of Morgan City relating to the construction of the port’s new Government Emergency and Operations Center.
The Morgan City Harbor and Terminal District commission approved a parking servitude agreement with the City of Morgan City for the construction of a parking lot at the port’s Government Emergency and Operations Center, located on La. 182 in Morgan City, adjacent to the Morgan City Municipal Auditorium.
A total of 161 parking spaces will be constructed on the auditorium grounds while 40 spaces will be put on the property on which the center is being built, Morgan City Mayor Frank “Boo” Grizzaffi said. The parking plan is consistent with the city’s master plan for the auditorium, Port Attorney Gerard Bourgeois said.
The master project budget for the center is fixed at $9,866,667, Project Manager Walter Adams said. That budget includes the state’s contribution of $7.1 million, the port’s $2,366,667 match and an additional $400,000 the port commission approved to use if necessary, Adams said.
The center can serve as an emergency command center during events such as hurricanes and will also house tenants from governmental agencies on a day-to-day basis.
“As long as we have this servitude agreement or an agreement in place for the tenants to use the parking during the business hours, we’ll get credit for that on our match,” Bourgeois said. The city also has to adopt an ordinance for that agreement, and the ordinance would allow port officials to use the auditorium twice a year, he said.
Grizzaffi said the city will have a public hearing on the ordinance at its Sept. 23 council meeting. The port’s Government Emergency and Operations Center is going to be a great advantage to the city, the mayor said. “It’s a great use of land, land that we owned that sat there and was being used for nothing, and now we’re going to have a multi-million dollar facility,” Grizzaffi said.
In April, the Morgan City Harbor and Terminal District commission approved signing a cooperative endeavor agreement with the city to transfer 75 feet of city property across from the Morgan City Municipal Auditorium for use as the site for the new government operations and emergency center.
In exchange for the use of the property, the port board agreed to provide work compensation or payment of the appraised value of the property, which was about $98,000, Bourgeois said. Funding more parking spaces at the auditorium is included in the port’s work compensation for the use of city land to build the center. The port also purchased land from private landowners in order to construct the center.
The first phase of work on the center, which involves clearing the site and doing drainage work, began Sept. 2, Port of Morgan City Executive Director Raymond “Mac” Wade said.
Adams said the first phase of work at the site of the port’s new Government Emergency and Operations Center was awarded to Acadiane Renovations of Franklin for $287,000, and work has begun to clear the ground. Adams expects the first phase of work to be complete by end of November, he said.
The first phase consists of clearing the trees and grass on-site and installing subsurface drainage while the second phase entails actually constructing the center.
Architect Carl Blum submitted construction documents for the second phase of work Thursday to the state’s facility and planning board, Adams said. The state is funding 75 percent of the project, which is in the form of $7.1 million in a non-cash line of credit. That state funding is scheduled to go before the state bond commission in October, Adams said.
Once port officials receive bids for the actual construction of the center about 30 days after approval by the bond commission, they will be able to finalize the master project schedule, Adams said. The center is projected to open by late August 2015 or early September 2015, Adams said.
A total of $957,493.01 has been spent already for real estate planning and design, reconstruction, geotechnical investigation, and project management, which will go toward the port’s required match for the project, he said.
The master plan for the project includes detailed engineering and planning for special equipment and systems required in the building, Adams said. “The procurement of those specialized items in the area of audio-visual, radio communication, telephonic communication and other types of security systems and software will occur separately from the construction bid packages,” Adams said.