In need of space

Plans are in the works for a new multi-functional county building.

County officials are looking into constructing a facility for Jay Emergency Medical Service’s Portland base, Jay County Health Department and Jay County Coroner’s Office.

“It only made sense to put all three together,” said commissioner Chad Aker, who has been involved with the planning process. He noted the departments have to connect with one another at various levels. Both JEMS and the health department have also cited a need for more space.

Proposed plans call for a joint building with separate offices for each department. New aspects of the conjoined facilities would include larger work areas with shared meeting rooms.

An initial sketch of the project composed by JEMS and health department officials comes to around 11,500 square feet. Its cost estimate: about $2.26 million.

Current facility designs give JEMS extra storage areas, locker rooms for men and women (it currently has one shower) and two more living quarters — it currently has two — for employees working 24-hour shifts. It would have more garage space as well, providing room to house up to four ambulances.

The proposed structure would offer a more open space for the health department, allowing for more social distancing and more patrons to events like vaccination clinics.

It would also give the coroner and coroner’s deputies a 24-hour, easily accessible office. (The current office is located at Jay County Courthouse, which is closed at night.)

The three departments are regularly in contact with each other.

Having a central location would allow for more efficient communication, said coroner Michael Brewster.

“We have to work hand-in-hand together, and it would be easier if we were located in one building,” Brewster said.

Construction on the current JEMS base at 902 N. Creagor St., Portland, finished in 1993. The facility is approximately 1,977 square feet — more than half of that space is taken up by the garage.

Jay County Health Department’s building at 504 W. Arch St., Portland, dates back to 1962. Standing at roughly 3,000 square feet, rooms are sectioned off into small spaces, making it difficult to host large vaccination clinics or other events.

Over the course of the coronavirus pandemic, the health department has realized a need for a larger and updated facility, said Jay County Health Department environmentalist and administrator Heath Butz. Currently, there is not much space for social distancing or for COVID-19 vaccination clinics, which started in January.

“COVID has been a big eye-opener for us,” he said. “We just don’t have the capacity here.”

Aker noted if another pandemic were to break out, the health department’s current facility would not be an ideal location for managing health concerns such as for diagnoses or vaccinations.

With a bigger building, Butz said, “we could have (a) good meeting space and better flow, and (space) to serve the community better.”

As of Monday, JEMS has been on 2,631 ambulance runs so far this year. That’s a record number for the department, with last year’s figure coming to about 2,400. (JEMS surpassed that amount in October this year.) The majority of runs are in the Portland area.

“Run totals are increasing dramatically to the point where we could have a third, full-time crew, and we’d have enough runs to do that, but unfortunately our (current) facilities will not support a third, full-time crew,” Aker said.

There isn’t a specific reason as to why ambulance runs have been up in 2021, said JEMS director Gary Barnett. All types of calls, from falls to traumas, have been more prevalent this year.

“We’re definitely a lot more active, a lot busier,” he said. “There’s no rhyme or reason to it. We’d like to blame COVID, but I don’t see an extravagant amount of COVID-related runs.”

The coronavirus pandemic has, however, overall increased a need for personal protective equipment and other supplies. And, with more runs, JEMS has needed more supplies on hand.

Officials put together a list of necessities and drew up a basic floor plan of the proposed building. Kerry Muhlenkamp of Muhlenkamp Building Corp. then reviewed their ideas and shared cost estimates, which came to about $2.26 million.

Funding has not yet been committed toward the project, although Aker said options are being considered. The county’s first application for an OCRA grant was denied recently, but it may reapply next year. County officials may also apply for dollars from the IU Health Jay Hospital Legacy Endowment Fund.

Other options include requesting some of the nearly $4 million in federal American Rescue Plan Act monies allocated to the county or seeking a portion of the economic development dollars received from Bitter Ridge Wind Farm — Jay County currently has about $1.3 million of those funds not yet allocated. (The county is also expected to receive several million dollars in economic development funds from three planned solar farm projects.)

There’s also no set location for the building yet. One suggestion has been to build north of the existing JEMS Portland base at 902 N. Creagor Ave., but no official decisions have been made.

Aker believes the project is a necessity and hopes to see plans come to fruition.

“It’s important for the health of Jay County,” he said. “We’ve just proven we’ve outgrown our facilities.”