RALEIGH -- The city's council members can't decide whether to go ahead with a $205 million project for a new public safety center but agreed Tuesday to begin talking about their differences with professionals.
Outside consultants - architects, public safety experts or others - could help sort through the divide on the deadlocked, eight-member council and help bring forward some type of consensus, Raleigh Mayor Charles Meeker said.
Meeker has been the council's strongest proponent of building the 17-story structure, the most controversial topic the council has handled this year.
He and three council members - Mary-Ann Baldwin, Bonner Gaylord and Russ Stephenson - will begin meeting as soon as next week to start figuring out which consultants could best help the council come to a decision. There was no mention Tuesday of what such counseling would cost taxpayers.
The council has been deadlocked since March 2 on the Lightner project, designed to house thecity's police, fire, emergency communications and information technology departments. The project was shelved because of concerns about the cost of the project and initial plans for a property tax increase to pay for it.
Raleigh City Manager Russell Allen also outlined Tuesday how the Clarence E. Lightner Center, named for the city's first black mayor, can be built without raising property taxes.
Allen's new funding model recommends building the 17-story, 300,000-square-foot tower by taking out two $100 million loans, delaying some public works projects, and hoping that sales tax or other revenues pick up in the city over the next few years to cover an estimated $9 million in other expenses for the project.
Going forward with the project now could mean taking advantage of low construction costs as well as low interest rates, Meeker and Allen have said. But it also comes as the Raleigh council is preparing to make $6 million to $8 million in cuts to its general fund because of falling sales tax revenue, a bind as city officials draw up the budget for the next fiscal year, which starts in July.
