From the City’s website:

The study linked below will be presented at the Mayor and Council Work Session on Monday, March 26 at 7:30 p.m. at Gaithersburg City Hall.

The Senior Center has been a controversial issue for several years now. Housed on the ground floor of what used to be a hotel but which is now mostly used for transitional housing, it has been “making do” with its space almost since it first went into operation more than ten years ago. Recently there has been increasing pressure to do something about the sub-standard conditions in this facility, with many seniors in particular demanding that the City build a new facility, designed from the ground up as a senior center. The developer of the Casey East property has set aside some land for this purpose. However, the City has not, as far as I know, yet committed to building a center in that location, and some question whether that location — far to the north side of the City — would really work well for Gaithersburg Seniors (although a parallel question doesn’t seem to have been asked with regard to the new swim center). One other major point of contention is the use of this facility by County residents who do not live within the City limits, and who thus do not pay City taxes. Montgomery County does subsidize the cost of running the existing center, but the subsidy does not come near covering the proportionate cost supporting the use by non-City residents, who make up more than 60% of the membership of the Center. The agreement with the County prohibits the City from charging a higher rate for County residents to use the center’s services. This issue remains unresolved.

The study that has just been released was done in this context. The focus of the study was, in essence, to answer the question of whether the useful life of the existing center could be extended. The answer, according to the architects, appears to be yes, within some limits, given some assumptions on utilization growth, accepting the loss of some green space, allowing some functions to be moved out with improved transportation to compensate, given about $2.6 Million, and accepting that the center will have to be shut down for a considerable period of time while the reconstruction is being done. One of what is sure to be one of the more controversial aspects of this report is that it identifies a number of safety- and ADA-related code violations in the existing facility that would need to be corrected as part of any reconstruction. Many of the “deficiencies” result only from the code having changed from when the facility was constructed, but some appear to violate even the older code. This of course raises the question of what to do about these deficiencies if the reconstruction is not done and no new senior center is built. My impression is that just patching all the problems and bringing the facility up to modern code could cost nearly as much as the entire reconstruction the architects have proposed.

Following is the Executive Summary from the report. I’ve copied and pasted the text from the PDF to this web page, but have recreated the formatting manually. Please refer to the original PDF for the authoritative text, and let me know if you spot any errors in my transcription.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

GOALS

  • Evaluate current building configuration, condition, and utilization.
  • Identify Building Code non-compliance issue(s).
  • Review current and anticipated (i.e. future 10 years) space usage and needs.
  • Evaluate needs/problems identified by Gaithersburg Upcounty Senior Center staff/volunteers/members.
  • Develop a plan to maximize use of the existing facility for current and anticipated (i.e. future 10-years’) needs.

APPROACH

  • Establish a core project team composed of Center operational and facilities staff and design professionals to manage and guide the study.
  • Gather information on existing conditions and current needs through field investigations, onsite observations, member and staff surveys, staff interviews, and project team discussions.
  • Generate a 10-year-projection based on census data, historical Center participation, staff projections, and industry practices.

CONCLUSIONS

  • The “existing conditions survey” indicates that the Center has the following Building Code and program deficiencies:
    • Dead end corridors more than 20 feet in length.
    • Poorly located and non-ADA-compliant restrooms resulting in inadequate member access and limited staff monitoring.
    • Based on standard architectural space planning practices, the present circulation routing is disorienting. Predictability of a space is essential to reduce confusion. Special consideration must be given to developing patterns of circulation that facilitate way-finding.
    • The existing administration/member services area is undersized and lacks dedicated space for members and staff to function properly.
    • The activity areas are sufficient in number but lack adequate space to house the scheduled classes resulting in participants spilling out to adjacent areas/rooms and disrupting those activities.
  • The “current needs assessment” indicates that the Center has the following shortcomings to properly address current member and staff needs:
    • Daily member participation averages 104 active members per day or over 27,000 visits per year. Approximately 38% (or 40 members) are city residents and approximately 62% (or 64 members) are non-city residents.
    • General office space is inadequately sized to allow visitor consultations.
    • There is no wellness office to meet current members’ medical needs.
    • A staff conference room is needed for staff meetings and training so as to keep these activities from intruding on member service spaces.
    • Additional storage is needed for all activities as the “storage spaces” have been converted to usable/activity space.
    • Overflow conditions, waiting lists, and scheduling conflicts can be reduced if the dining room, billiards room, lecture/meeting room, multipurpose room, computer room, and arts and crafts room are increased in size.
    • Because the card room occupies space in a corridor, a dedicated card room should be added.
    • Additionally, the computers occupy a corridor and should have their own room.
  • The “projected needs assessment” indicates that the facility may experience at least a 100% increase over the next 10 years.
    • The projected average daily member participation is expected to increase to approximately 200 active members per day or 52,000 visits per year.
    • To accommodate the increased membership, additional staff and their corresponding space will be required, including additional business office space, an additional counseling room, additional exam rooms, additional program assistant rooms, and a volunteer workroom. The staff conference room will require enlargement in order to accommodate the additional staff.
    • The restroom facilities must increase in number to meet Code.
    • A family toilet room should be added to accommodate multi-generational needs.
    • An additional food service line and updated kitchen facility are needed to serve the increase in members and to meet Code requirements.
    • Additional storage will be needed.
    • The dining room, billiards room, lecture/meeting room, computer room, and arts and crafts room will all need to be increased in size.
    • A pottery/ceramic room, arts/paints room, library/media room, fitness center, changing/locker rooms, retail/convenience shop, stage area, general classroom, music room, and an outdoor space will be needed for the additional programs planned to service the increased membership.

RECOMMENDATIONS

  • The study clearly indicates that the current facility cannot fully support the current needs of the Senior Center and, most certainly, cannot meet the projected needs over the next 10-year period.
  • The proposed improvement plan is two-fold:
    1. Take advantage of two small areas for additions and reconfigure the existing space to maximize its use;
    2. Implement a transportation program to utilize off-site facilities to meet the expanding needs of the membership. (A transportation plan is not within the scope of this study.)
  • The following modifications to the existing facility are proposed (please refer to the Existing, Expansion, and Proposed Drawings in the Section 6, References, of this document):
    • Enclose and incorporate two small areas, approximately 600 square feet each, outside the existing building to add approximately 1,200 square feet (refer to Expansion drawing in Section 6).
    • Move the administration area into the long narrow portion of the existing dining room.
    • Convert the full-service kitchen into a serving kitchen.
    • Move the expanded restrooms into the current area of the existing dining room and kitchen (refer to Drawing A-3, Proposed, in Section 6).
    • Move the arts and crafts room into the remaining administration space, add a computer room, and expand the lecture/meeting room into the available corridor space (refer to Proposed drawing in Section 6).
    • Move the dining room into the space vacated by the multipurpose room, arts and crafts and the existing dead-end corridor (refer to Proposed drawing in Section 6).
  • The extent of the proposed modifications is such that the Center would have to close during renovation. Use/occupancy during renovation is not feasible because the Senior Center cannot provide adequate services to the members in only a portion of the existing building. This requires that the Senior Center operate from an off-site location during the renovations.

ALTERNATE CONSIDERATION

  • If membership is limited to City residents only (currently, about 40 members per day; approximately 38% of total members) and there is a 100% increase in membership over the next 10 years, it appears that the existing facility could operate with less strain on its current resources and use the 10-year time frame to build a new facility. The impact on the community of, essentially, excluding more than 60% of its current members for this length of time is beyond the scope of this study.

COST ESTIMATE

  • 1,200 sq.ft. Additions x $300/sq.ft. = $360,000
  • 11,400 sq.ft. Renovations x $195/sq.ft. =$2,223,000
    TOTAL $2,583,000