Findings- Building, Location Issues & Department Needs

Findings - Building and Location Issues

• All of our major public buildings—Fire Department, Police and Ambulance, Town Hall and the Annex—are in a poor location and/or in poor condition. Often, the existing structure simply is not large enough to accommodate their needs today, let alone in the future.
• New Sites are hard to come by. Major Town functions should be in central locations with easy access to and from all parts of town. These are the areas that are already built-up and expensive.

The availability of parking Downtown is a serious municipal need of its own that is affected (and possibly improved) by the decisions we make about our municipal buildings.

• We often find that the Town does have property that meets a department's specific location and space requirements, but it is being used for some other, less appropriate purpose.
• In order to arrive at an appropriate long-term pattern of use for these facilities, we will need to move some things around.

Findings - Department Needs

• Most departments at Town Hall and the Annex generally need about double the space currently available.
• The Fire and ambulance services are under great pressure to find new quarters within the next three or four years in order to accommodate new vehicles and equipment.
• More meeting and conference spaces for both public and private meetings are needed.
• More working storage and long-term storage areas for paperwork and records are needed
• None of the departments surveyed expect a major increase in personnel in the future. (One or two new employees at the most.)
• Major public meeting needs such as Town Meeting may be accommodated in existing facilities—Cornell Theater, the Tisbury Elementary School, and the Senior Center.
• Departments don't necessarily need to be located in the same building with all the other town agencies, but related functions should be grouped together.
• For the convenience of the public, it helps to have all the administrative departments (the ones now split between Town Hall and the Annex) in one place.
• The Police have unique security needs. They can, and to some extent prefer, to be separate from other emergency services.
• The Ambulance Service operations are more related to Fire Department operations and should be separated from the Police and grouped with the Fire Department.
• All the departments need a much more reliable, immediate, and comprehensive communication system that would provide easy access to records and information (an intranet). Access to information is more important than physical proximity.