Brad Hollerbach is the Director of Information Technology for the Southeast Missourian. His opinions are his own and do not reflect those of the newspaper or its editorial board. He writes this blog primarily for his own amusement and to parody the absurdities of the world we live in. He lives with his wife and two cats that don't really care for one another in Cape.

Is City Hall A Potential Deathtrap?

Posted Friday, April 23, 2010, at 12:00 AM

I was paying my water bill at the City Hall in downtown Cape Girardeau the other day, and had a sudden urge to put on a hardhat.

It's not that the building is under construction. It is not. And it's not that City Hall LOOKS like it needs to be constructed on. It doesn't.

But after entering the building and rounding the corner to go down the hall to pay my bill, I spied one of the fanciful murals by a water fountain reminding visitors of the building's previous life.

City Hall once was a school, a public elementary school and it is very old.

Not quite as old as Franklin School which the public school district is planning on flattening in the near future in their best effort to modernize their facilities, but it's almost as old.

Franklin opened its doors in 1927 and New School -- that's what the school was called that is now City Hall -- opened 10 years later.

But I can't imagine that construction techniques changed much between the mid 1920s and the mid 1930s, so that probably explains the sudden urge to put on a hardhat while entering City Hall.

If I'm to believe what I'm told -- and you know, I always do -- then City Hall is structurally comparable to Franklin. And since Franklin is liable to collapse any day now, then one would surmise that City Hall might do the same.

They're nearly the same age with the same type of masonry construction and neither building has gone through expensive seismic retrofits that I'm aware of.

We need to face reality. City Hall is a potential deathtrap.

It's only a matter of time before it -- like Franklin -- implodes upon itself thanks to old age and shoddy workmanship.

So the mayor and the city council better start figuring out how to pay for a new city hall, because we're going to need it.

In the meantime, any visits I make to the building will be quick as possible. You'll know me if you see me. I'll be the guy sprinting down the corridor wearing a hardhat.

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Are you suggesting a fine line between historic and stately versus old and obsolete? Could it be a political perspective?

-- Posted by Old John on Fri, Apr 23, 2010, at 8:25 AM
Hmmmmm.... now that you mention it Old John, I suppose you could be right.

I find it amusing in the US about how quickly things become "obsolete." I see it all the time with technology. Users have gotta to have the latest and greatest of a particular computer program even though it does very little more than its predecessor.

You better be careful with a screenname like "Old John." This website might decide that you're too old and not hip enough to post and terminate your account because we feel your sending a message of obsolence.

Might I suggest changing your screenname to something like "O.J." or "Cool Young John" as a precaution...

Thanks for reading.

-- Posted by Brad_Hollerbach on Fri, Apr 23, 2010, at 9:11 AM
You're lucky to be in Cape where buildings stick around for decades, if not centuries.

Down here in South Florida, I photographed the first service to be held in a small church in Jupiter, FL.

Ten years later, I photographed the county fire department conducting a training burn in the church so it could be torn down to become a McDonald's.

-- Posted by ksteinhoff on Fri, Apr 23, 2010, at 8:10 PM
Using the same brilliant logic to destroy "historic" Franklin School, the British should demolish Buckingham Palace to make space for a new shopping mall with second floor residence quarters for the Queen.

Unfortunately, we do not have the same reverance for the past as our cousins across the Pond.

Some politicians in Cape just ain't got no class.

-- Posted by voyager on Sun, Apr 25, 2010, at 12:21 PM

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