City sounds alarm for system to alert emergency personnel
By KIM CALVERT Special to the Daily Press
COUNCIL CHAMBERS — Elected leaders are expected tonight to spend nearly $1.4 million to overhaul the city’s largest downtown parking garage.
Located on the west side of Fourth Street, between Broadway and Santa Monica Boulevard, parking structure No. 5 is in need of a seismic retrofit. The structure will remain open when work begins in March to shore up walls and foundations. Federal grants will provide some of the funding for the project, which is expected to be completed by October.
West Valley Investment Group submitted the winning bid for the project at $1,081,150. An additional 10 percent is being allotted by the city as a contingency fee.
West Valley provided seismic retrofit projects for UCLA and the Los Angels County Department of Public Works. Another company, Black & Veatch, will handle inspection, testing, noise monitoring and construction management services for $210,000, included in the project’s total price tag.
In 2002, City Hall approved an extensive plan to retrofit parking structures 2, 4 and 5; as well as to rebuild parking structures 1, 3 and 6. City Hall also plans to add additional parking throughout the downtown area. The projects will include Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) upgrades.
City officials also plan to spend an additional $7,000 in grant money on a software maintenance contract to complement an automated staff scheduling and notification system for the police and (Editor’s note: This is part of an ongoing series that tracks the city’s expenditures appearing on the upcoming Santa Monica City Council consent agenda. Consent agenda items are routinely passed by the City Council with little or no discussion from elected officials or the public.) fire departments.
City Hall last year accepted a $111,518 Homeland Security Grant for the system. Homeland Security regulations require that the police and fire departments be able to notify staff quickly during an emergency. Right now, the manual notification process is costly and slow. The new system will apply specific rules in a decision-making hierarchy to automatically notify staff by phone, e-mail and pager with details. The system then allows emergency workers to respond in regards to their availability.
The City Council is also expected to approve the purchase of three years’ worth of software maintenance for the system. The total cost for the project is now $118,677.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on February 8, 2005. Read the original PDF.