By Jeremy Weldon

A picture may be worth a thousand words, but not $7,500 to the Batesville Mayor and Board of Aldermen.

The City Board declined to approve a request by Public Works Director David Karr for a second architectural rendering of the proposed municipal complex under consideration for Van Voris St.  in west Batesville.

Last month board members agreed to have an engineering firm submit plans, cost analysis, and other requested information for the new city buildings on Van Voris after hearing the suggestion from Karr. They approved $7,500 for a drawing of the proposed buildings last month.

At Tuesday’s meeting Karr told aldermen an engineer was almost finished with a drawing that will show a new fire station and Public Works Dept. buildings, and would provide a second rendering that included a new City Hall.

“I don’t care if you get one or not, but it might be nice to have the two renderings to look at and see your options,” Karr said. Asked about the price, Karr said he was unsure, but thought it might be less than the original $7,500 cost. He asked the board to consider doubling the amount of money allowed for the drawings to $15,000, although he said the cost might be just $2,000-$3,000 more.

Mayor Jerry Autrey told the board he was against paying for a new drawing, especially with the added costs. “I don’t need to pay $7,500 to look at a picture of a City Hall that will never, ever be built on Van Voris Street,” he told Karr. “Nobody on this board wants that.”

The board generally agreed with the Mayor’s sentiment, but were reticent to vote against the request for the second rendering.

“I can tell you right now, no offense to you, David, but I will never vote to have this board put City Hall over there,” Alderman Stan Harrison said. “I’m ready to build a nice new City Hall when this board decides to, but it won’t be on Van Voris Street.”

Harrison said if fellow board members believed a second rendering would be beneficial he would not stop them, and then made a motion to have the City Hall version produced. After just a short wait Autrey declared the matter closed as Harrison’s motion did not get a second.

Different boards over the years have wanted to build a new fire station for the downtown area – the station behind City Hall on College St. now is decades old and inadequate to staff with paid firefighters. Instead, volunteers come to that station when needed for fire and rescue calls, mostly those in west Batesville.

Also, board members had previously budgeted for new office and storage space for the Street Department (the current building has a collapsed roof), and better facilities for the Water Dept. and other needed offices.

Because the city owns most of the property in the first block of Van Voris, Karr said the city should build there, dedicating a manned fire station on the west side of the railroad tracks. Fire Chief Tim Taylor agreed, noting that a majority of the calls in city limits come from that portion of town, which has older homes built when construction codes were non-existent or not enforced.

Combined with the several sets of low-income and need-based apartment complexes, those structures are more likely to have higher occurrences of fire and smoke related instances than newer homes.

Board members agree a new fire station and some department offices should be built on Van Voris, but are less sure about the prospect of having a new City Hall built in that section of the city.