Agenda item

Report to follow.

The Director of Corporate Services presented the report which set out capital works required at Service Training Centre (STC) in order to address some of the concerns about the current facilities.

 

It recommended investment in:-

 

·        A refurbishment of the Fire House;

·        An extension to the existing Fleet Workshop to provide a number of enhanced  facilities;

·        A refurbishment of Astley House to provide improved Incident Command Training facilities;

·        An enhanced conferencing facilities and disabled access at Lancaster House, subject to agreement on the long term future of this facility.

 

Members considered the current facilities in terms of the dedicated buildings on site and the practical training facilities.  It was noted that given a lack of historical investment, a number of the facilities either had or were reaching the end of their economic life and either needed replacing or refurbishing. 

 

The investment required was broken down into the 4 distinct areas of i) Fire House; ii) Fleet Garage Extension; iii) Astley House Refurbishment; and iv) Lancaster House. 

 

It was noted that no allowance had been made for the potential relocation of Service Headquarters (SHQ) to the site. This project had been previously approved in 2012/13 at a capital cost of £10m; however; this was put on hold in 2013 and remained so, pending the outcome of discussions with the Police about shared estates strategy.  It was noted that even if the relocation of SHQ project was live it would have minimal impact on these proposals as the only facilities’ included in these proposals which also featured in the SHQ project were the relocation of the Incident Command Training facility and the development of conferencing facilities replacing those in Lancaster House. It was also noted that the type of buildings referred to in the options presented would not be suitable for a SHQ or main training facility, as they were a simpler more cost effective portal construction, similar to the existing Fleet garage facility.  Furthermore in the five years that had elapsed the cost of relocating SHQ would have changed significantly  due to inflationary impacts and changing requirements.

 

i) Fire House

The Fire House had been in situ for almost 30 years.  The Condition Survey of the Fire House undertaken in November 2017, confirmed the following “The Fire House was constructed in the 1980’s and has been well used, with only minimum maintenance undertaken and this was reflected in its overall condition.“

 

Overall it was in good condition with some repairs being necessary to prevent further deterioration. The repairs if undertaken in the next 12 months would prevent further deterioration of the structure and the building should, if correctly maintained remain in good condition without requiring major expenditure on the fabric for a further 20 years.

 

The Building Services systems were in a much poorer condition and were well beyond their replacement cycle. Failure to replace these, whilst not affecting the fabric of the building would hinder and slow a safe evacuation of the building in an emergency, therefore replacement of safety critical systems such as the lighting system was recommended. Given the conditions found in a fire house, it was expected that the average life expectancy of the building services systems would be 10 years, rather than the 20 years of a typical office or fire station premises.

 

As part of any refurbishment additional works could be undertaken. This would provide more versatility in terms of the range of scenarios on offer in this facility. During the review of National Operational Guidance it had been identified that currently LFRS had a very limited provision for basement firefighting training. Therefore the proposal replaced 2 of the existing raking ladders with staircases, providing a better range of options for typical firefighting scenarios. It would also provide an option for a realistic basement scenario, albeit the entry would be from the roof terrace area on the second floor.

 

It was not possible to amend the design of the building to provide an effective High Rise Training facility hence, provision of that training facility would need to be sourced elsewhere.

 

The estimated capital cost of the proposed refurbishment was £350k, and the works were currently planned for April-June next year. The cost of this work could be met from the capital budget identified for 2019/20, as set out in the draft capital programme presented last year.

 

In response to a concern raised by County Councillor Beavers that detailed cost information should be presented to the Committee to make the decision on whether to refurbish or rebuild, the Director of Corporate Services confirmed that an independent consultant had provided the cost estimate.  It was noted that if the Fire House was to be demolished and rebuilt alternative training facilities would be required and the timescale would be more than the 3 month’s identified for the redevelopment.

 

In response to Member concerns about the payment of contract variation costs the Director of Corporate Services advised that there would inevitably be some instances of variation to allow for the unknown; it was possible to pass risk to the contractor as part of the tender process, but that came at a premium and may not be used and therefore would not be value for money. 

 

In response to Member concerns, the Director of Corporate Services confirmed that the procurement process would be followed, including seeking Member Tender Panel approval to award the contract and monitoring of the contract would be included in the High Value Procurement Projects reported to each Resources Committee.

 

ii) Fleet Garage Extension

This project initially started as an extension to provide an enhanced workshop facility for the Fleet and Engineering Services maintenance team who had relocated to STC to work alongside BA recovery colleagues and provide a more integrated service, thus delivering staffing efficiencies.

 

Changes to BA training/servicing, including the need to separate out dirty and clean areas and therefore avoid cross contamination, and the need to expand the size of the servicing area to accommodate increased work as maintenance was no longer carried out on station, had led to an increased scope.

 

Further scoping works were undertaken to identify any other requirements that STC had for this type of building, an element of which was considering how the requirement was currently met and what the long-term viability of existing facilities was. This led to a proposal to include the provision of a number of additional facilities within the new build:-

 

·        Provision of suitable accommodation for trainers, which was currently provided in Midgeley House, including enhancement of female facilities.

·        Provision of suitable “dirty” welfare facilities/lockers for recruits/students, at the present time the only facilities were provided in Astley House and were not separated into clean and dirty facilities, and thereby didn’t lend themselves to the Service discharging its responsibilities under the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations.

·        Provision of gym facilities, replacing those in Alf Ramsey House and enabling this building to be returned to its original use, as a storage facility.

·        Provision of Driving School accommodation, replacing that included in Lancaster House which could be re-utilised as an enhanced ICT resilience facility as well as ICT training suite (no costings had been allowed for this pending a decision on what equipment was required).

·        Provision of a Training Area, enabling amongst other things improved fitness testing and providing enhanced outdoor training facilities for inclement weather.

·        Provision of a new secure vehicle compound, as the site was now more accessible as it was used by other parties.

 

The estimated capital cost of this work, including the demolition of the old Midgeley House building, was £3,900k.  A summary of the benefits of these proposals was:

 

·        Enhanced facilities for Fleet and Equipment Services;

·        Breathing Apparatus Classrooms;

·        Breathing Apparatus Cleaning (internal and External) and Storage area;

·        Breathing Apparatus Cylinder Charging and Storage Facilities;

·        Enhanced Breathing Apparatus decontamination facilities;

·        Additional Space for Breathing Apparatus Recovery;

·        P.P.E. Storage and Management Facilities;

·        Enhanced EDI facilities;

·        Additional dedicated Student Locker Rooms, Changing Area and Shower Facilities;

·        Trainer and Trainer Support Locker Room, Changing Area and Shower Facilities;

·        Trainer Office and ICT Facilities;

·        Dedicated Gym Facility;

·        Covered External Area for Physical Fitness Testing;

·        Teaching and Office Facilities for Driving School;

·        Relocation of the Fire Brigades Union Office;

·        Relocation of the existing ICT Suite from Astley House.

 

iii) Astley House Refurbishment

The move of BA training from Astley House to the Fleet Garage extension provided an opportunity to re-utilise the top floor (the bottom floor would remain as it was at present providing welfare/locker facilities for clean training that took place). In order to maximise this opportunity it was proposed to redesign the top floor to incorporate an upgraded Incident Command facility, thus enabling the Minerva building to be demolished. This work was included in the original SHQ proposals, hence should this option be pursued the original SHQ relocation would need to be amended (however it was noted that this accounted for less than 5% of the original plan and therefore would have fairly limited impact on costings.)

 

The estimated capital cost of this work, including the demolition of the old Minerva building, was £350k.

 

Combined Business Case Fleet Garage Extension and Astley House Refurbishment

 

A business case in respect of this combined change had been produced which looked at 4 options:-

 

·        Option 1: Do Minimum using existing buildings only;

·        Option 2: Do Minimum using existing buildings and extending them as required;

·        Option 3: Structural refurbishment and extension to provide all requirements and a full twenty five year life expectancy;

·        Option 4: New Build and limited refurbishment of existing (the option outlined above).

 

A summary comparison was considered by Members:-

 

Option	Total Built Floor Area	Capital Cost	Annual Life Cycle Cost	Twenty Five Year Whole Life Cost
Option 1: Existing Buildings only	1244sm	£1,023,990	£80,975	£3,048,365
Option 2: Do Minimum	2677sm	£4,140,127	£128,396	£7,350,027
Option 3: Full Refurbishment	2756sm	£5,201,340	£84,073	£7,303,165
Option 4: New Build	2575sm	£4,256,830	£69,706	£5,999,480

 

Whilst Option 4 had the least built area, it did have the second highest capital cost requirement, but this was offset by the lowest life cycle cost of the options, combining to create the lowest whole life cost of the 3 site development options (Options 2, 3 and 4).

 

Option 1 clearly identified that there was a considerable cost requirement to simply retain the existing buildings on the site as a number of them were reaching the end of their useful lives and required considerable expenditure. Expenditure of this magnitude on portable buildings beyond the end of their design life was ill advised and would have no effect on their asset value, which would continue to decline.

 

When viewed against this consideration, Option 4, represented an additional capital cost of £3.2m (over and above the base option), which would provide:

 

·        a reduction in revenue costs of £11k per annum (£282k over 25 years);

·        a net increase of 1,331 square metres of floor space;

·        an increase in the asset value of the property;

·        address the business need for a compliant building;

·        provide modern fit for purpose office and training environments;

·        relocate the Incident Command Suite and Command Team to Astley House providing a more suitable facility.

 

iv) Lancaster House

It was noted that 2 options were considered in respect of the proposals to relocate SHQ to this site:-

 

·        Construction of a new facility replacing that at SHQ, but maintaining Lancaster House in its current format;

·        Demolishing Lancaster House and constructing one new combined facility.

 

At the time of the proposal Members agreed the second option, in order to provide a new combined facility. This new building would include conferencing facilities, and hence would make the following proposal redundant. However should Lancaster House remain in its current guise in the long term then some improvements were required.

 

In 2011 some refurbishment work was undertaken to improve facilities and extend its usable life, pending any decision on the potential relocation of SHQ. At that time the old gymnasium was converted to a large open space which had been used as a conferencing facility, but was clearly far from ideal. Further to this the toilet facilities for this were extremely poor, with no disabled facility. Nor was there any facility to allow disabled access to the first floor of Lancaster House, and hence this did not comply with the “access for all” agenda. (It did not currently contravene legislation, but it would do if LFRS had a disabled employee or visitor who tried to access the space).

 

To address these issues and enhance the environment with suitable facilities for a modern conference venue two options have been reviewed:-

 

·        Option A - Create a “fit for purpose” modern, flexible conference space with associated upgraded toilet facilities including the provision of a disabled toilet. This would ensure that the ground floor and conference facility complied with current legislation, which they currently did not. The conference facility would be capable of division to create two medium sized meeting rooms or one large room for pass out parades and authority meetings. Costs were estimated at £320k;

·        Option B - As above but with the addition of creating disabled access to the first floor. Costs were estimated at £360k. It was noted that this option would not fully comply with disabled access requirements as there would still be no disabled access to the office accommodation on the mezzanine level.

 

Until such time as a decision on the long-term future of Lancaster House was reached it was not proposed to pursue this option further. However should Lancaster House be retained in its current usage, option B was the preferred option, i.e. providing enhanced conferencing facilities and some disabled access to classrooms.

 

Members discussed and agreed that Lancaster House should not be considered for rebuild or refurbishment until a decision was made about the potential relocation of Service Headquarters.  The Chairman, CC De Molfetta asked Officers to review options around the potential to relocate Service Headquarters to a future meeting.

 

Summary

Approval of this work would future proof the site and address some of the under-investment, although it was recognised that changing training requirements may impact on this.

 

With the exception of Lancaster House works none of this would be impacted by the potential relocation of SHQ, nor would it impact on the likely site for any relocation.  It was also noted that the potential relocation of Police Civil Disorder training would also not impact on this works.

 

Timing

If supported this work would need to be considered alongside the other capital programme items to agree a draft timetable for construction/refurbishment. However in terms of current thinking the fire House was scheduled for refurbishment in April-July 2019, and this timing was currently reflected in next year’s training plan. The new Fleet Garage extension could commence in 2019/20, although it was likely to span 2019/20 and 2020/21. Changes to Astley House would be scheduled after this work had been completed (late 2020/21). Conferencing facilities at STC were dependent on other decisions, hence a realistic timeframe appeared to be late 2020/21, but we would not comply with disability requirements until such time as works were undertaken.

 

Financial Implications

 

The capital budget approved last year included the:

 

Fleet Workshop Extension (18/19)	£2,400k
Fire House Refurbishment (19/20)	£750k
Minerva Replacement (19/20)	£1,250k
Lancaster House Refurbishment (19/20)	£500k
	£4,900k

 

Based on the above options estimated costs were:

 

Fire House Refurbishment	£350k
Fleet Workshop Extension	£3,900k
Astley House Refurbishment	£350k
Lancaster House Refurbishment	£360k
Total	£4,960k

 

It was noted that estimated costs were broadly in line with budget, but would be subject to change dependent upon inflationary pressures and any future revision to plans.

 

RESOLVED: - That the Committee:

 

·        Approved the refurbishment of the Fire House at an estimated cost of £350k;

·        Approved the extension of Fleet Garage at an estimated cost of £3,900k;

·        Approved the refurbishment of Astley House at an estimated  cost of £350k;

·        Noted the potential cost of £360k associated with refurbishing the conference facilities at Lancaster House, and determined that Lancaster House should not be considered for rebuild or refurbishment until a decision was made about the potential relocation of Service Headquarters.