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AMED is considering adding a second story to a new station that the ambulance authority intends to build in Lakemont, providing needed room for administrative and training functions, public education and the extra parking spaces those require.
The second story would cost an additional $350,000, bringing the total construction to nearly $1 million, and it would mean moving the organization's headquarters from the city to Logan Township, Executive Director Gary Watters told the board Monday.
At the current headquarters on the 1000 block of Seventh Avenue, the multipurpose board and training room is too small to accommodate all 56 full-time employees, much less the additional 44 part-timers, so meetings need to be held in four shifts, causing inefficiencies, Watters said.
The room's small size also means the authority can't offer required training to employees in-house, forcing AMED to pay to outsource that training, he said.
And the lack of space means the authority can't offer classes to the public in cardiopulmonary resuscitation, first aid and other subjects like an ambulance service in State College does, he said. That service's classes run daily, are frequently full and generate fees of $125 per student, Watters said.
Moreover, at the Altoona station, supervisors' work sites are next to one another on the perimeter of a single room, resulting in mutual distraction, while the need for human resources privacy has forced the authority to commandeer a former executive director's office for one employee, Watters said.
When AMED renovated a former warehouse to create its current headquarters station in 2005, it made structural provisions for adding a second story with minimum additional cost, Watters reminded the board.
The Finance Committee needs to determine whether it makes more sense to build that second story in Lakemont instead, realizing efficiencies because construction would be part of the overall building project.
One problem with building a second story on the "landlocked" site in Altoona is the lack of room for additional needed parking spaces to accommodate large meetings, training and education, according to architect Dave Albright.
But $350,000 for the second story in Lakemont is a lot of additional money, and the authority needs to spend public funds responsibly, board member Dave Cowger indicated.
"It's a lot to spring on us," he said.
The decision doesn't need to be made immediately, although it should be made no later than the next board meeting on March 19, Watters said.
AMED is planning to build the new station on Shand Avenue in Lakemont because it's losing its lease at the Lakemont Volunteer Fire Company's station on Logan Boulevard.
The fire company needs more room at the station for a new fire truck and to store equipment for a growing number of firefighters.
The new station won't be done by the time the lease with the fire company expires in August, so there will be a period during which AMED will need to rent a modular building to accommodate employees at the new site or to find a short-term rental property elsewhere, he said.
Board member Skip Mattas questioned the wisdom of moving the administration offices out of the city.
That shouldn't make a difference, as AMED is an authority that is equally a "child" of both the city and the township, said board Chairman Ray Hess.
Cowger wondered whether building a second story in Lakemont would be inconsiderate of residential neighbors, due to aesthetics.
Watters said no, because the roofline of the proposed two-story section would be lower than the roofline of the section that houses the ambulance bays, because of the need for high-clearance garage doors there.
AMED is working with PennDOT for permission to build a gated driveway to allow ambulances heading out on emergency runs direct access to Park Avenue, across from the ticket office of Peoples Natural Gas Field. That would allow ambulances to get to emergency scenes quicker and to avoid disturbing neighbors with flashing lights and sirens in the residential area, Albright said.
The driveway would be for egress only, Albright said.
Returning ambulances and employees arriving and leaving work would use a gated driveway off Shand Avenue, he said.
The public would access the site from Reimer Street, Watters said.
The new building in Lakemont will feature four bays, twice the number at the Lakemont fire station.
Mirror Staff Writer William Kibler is at 949-7038.