POWELL — Powell City Council approved allowing 2K General Company to renovate and expand the Lechler Building to include a 786 square-foot addition, roofing and siding improvements.
The project will cost over $1.3 million and will use city capital improvement dollars to fund construction, which also involves installing a dumpster enclosure and associated electrical, mechanical, and site improvements.
The city uses the 4,051 square-foot Lechler Building as a service garage facility for the public works department. It holds vehicles, such as the snow plow fleet, and other equipment related to public maintenance and projects.
“It’s not in the best shape from an interior and exterior perspective,” Assistant City Manager Jeff Tyler said.
“It really is a gateway into the city,” Tyler said. “We want to present it better, set a new tone for how we look as a city.”
That Powell look will include graphics on the building and general site clean-up, including landscaping surrounding a pond on the property.
“People will definitely be able to identify it as a city-owned facility,” Tyler said.
He said construction is expected to last 190 days and will not disrupt traffic to motorists, but the construction site will make the building off limits to the public.
Even with this expansion, the city still plans to eventually to relocate public works to a final facility eventually.
Background on project
The project comes as a result of city council approving the 2026 Facilities Master Plan earlier this year.
The plan recommended addressing two other buildings along with the Lechler Building, including the municipal building/police station at 47 Hall St. and the Adventure Park 260 Village Park Drive building that houses the Parks and Recreation and Public Service departments.
The plan suggested moving the municipal building to a more central location and creating a hard boundary or separate building for the police station.
As for the park building, the plan recommended rebuilding to add a community center and increase the storage capacity for the Public Service department, specifically for larger salt dome and brine-making stations, according to a city statement.
The plan also advised consolidating the storage of Lechler Building to the proposed new Parks and Recreation and Public Service complex.
“This will still be a city facility, use may change somewhat because of growth, but I still think it will be used in the public works inventory, even in the future,” Tyler said.
All those plans will not necessarily be addressed this year, but they are priorities for the city moving forward.
A railroad also runs through the Lechler Building property, and through a separate project, the city engineer is designing a pedestrian crossing for people to safely get to and from the Powell branch of the Delaware County District Library to Murphy Parkway.
“This was one of those connecting points where people have a hard time getting from Murphy Parkway across to the library. People try to cross railroad tracks, but there’s no defined crossing,” he said.
Tyler said construction on that project will likely not begin until the fall.
