Cape County commissioners select different site for emergency ops center

In a news release dated Tuesday, Dec. 13, Cape Girardeau County commissioners announced they will locate a new approximately 7,000-square-foot emergency operations center (EOC) not in county-owned Klaus Park — to which some residents objected in a series of meetings held last month — but on a 6-acre site to be purchased from Touchdown Development LLC at the southeast corner of Interstate 55 and Lasalle Avenue.

"Recently, a parcel of land previously considered became available due to a change in ownership," the release stated, noting the Touchdown purchase agreement includes water, sewer, fiber and infrastructure at a cost of $750,000.

Commissioners noted the county had unsuccessfully applied for a development grant in excess of $1 million for the previous Klaus Park venue.

Rationale

"This was a win-win," said Presiding Commissioner Clint Tracy, in an interview with the Southeast Missourian. "We see the need for an emergency operations center to keep the community safe. [The county] has a certain number of acres that we own, but as we dug a little deeper, we found a better opportunity that better fits our goal of delivering that layer of safety, and when you look at the development cost, it's frankly a no-brainer."

Tracy said it will ultimately cost less to buy and develop the I-55/Lasalle site than it would have to make the former Klaus Park site suitable for an operations center.

"We can purchase the ground and have it shovel-ready with all the necessary utilities for less than we would have spent at Klaus," Tracy added. "Obviously we also considered the concerns of the community, but when you look at the business side of this, what we're doing is clearly the right option."

American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds will be tapped to build the EOC, which will consolidate all relevant equipment in one location and will include administrative space for county, state and federal emergency personnel.

The I-55/Lasalle Avenue site will become the county's "incident command and operations center" and will meet "safe room" standards to withstand any natural disaster, the release continued.

Cape Girardeau County Associate Commissioner Charlie Herbst speaks at a Nov. 16 public meeting at Klaus Park in Jackson, which was under consideration for a new county emergency management building. On Tuesday, Dec. 13, the commission announced it had chosen a different location.Nathan English

History

Matt Smith with SEMO Mudcats, a local youth mountain biking team, had led others in objecting to using Klaus Park to locate the EOC.

"We're not opposed to the [emergency management] building but where it will be located," Smith said on Nov. 17. "Our team practiced over 800 hours in the last year at Klaus Park. You're putting it right in where we practice. It's no different than taking a baseball field from a baseball team. There is no other park available in Cape County where we can go and practice."

Need

Mark Winkler, the county's emergency management director, outlined last month for the commission what he saw as the necessity for a dedicated emergency ops building.

"Right now, [Office of Emergency Management] has some equipment — some of it is ours and some is federal equipment assigned to us — and the real problem is it's scattered all over the county. We're trying to bring it all together to make it readily accessible at a moment's notice — so we don't have to drive 15 miles one way to pick up equipment or 10 miles another way. We trying to design the [new] building to sustain 200 mile-per-hour winds so it can resist any violent tornadic activity in a worst-case scenario," he said.

Construction on the EOC structure is expected to start in mid-2023.