Tulsa Bond Issue Would Help Renovate Public Safety Center

Tulsa City Councilors are considering a bond issue and tax extension worth more than $700 million to do numerous improvement projects across the city.

Nearly $48 million of that money would fund a new public safety center for police, fire, emergency management and more.

The emergency management director said their space at the bottom of the Tulsa police headquarters was built for a city half this size.

He said they’ve worked around the issues for far too long.

Joseph Kralecik with Tulsa Area Emergency Management said when he started working in the emergency management building at 6th and Denver a decade ago, it was already outdated.

The center is the hub for all major emergencies and weather events and he said it’s way too small.

He said the building has had major flooding and is not equipped for modern technology and cables are everywhere, plus, the kitchen has flooded and rusted.

“I can’t utilize this kitchen to feed my first responders because the fire suppression system is not adequate," he said.

And the center itself is in an extremely inconvenient location, downtown in a basement.

“The condition of the facility at this point is starting to impact our ability to deliver the mission," he said.

Firefighters said the Tulsa fire headquarters, west of downtown, is dismal.

"It's decades old in a flood plain, certainly with limited capacity with storage and a lot of room for improvement there," said Matt Lay with Tulsa Fire.

Lay said the current fire headquarters has holes in the ceiling, leaks and the department has lots of old, outdated equipment including most of their vehicles.

“It’s a daily rotation of apparatus that are 15, sometimes 20 years old," said Lay.

The Improve our Tulsa plan would include about 60 million dollars to upgrade the fire fleet and 48 million to build the new public safety center in an existing city-owned building.

Kralicek said it's vital for public safety.

After the council approves the tax package in may, voters will vote on it in August.

The mayor said it will not raise taxes but will extend a tax already in place for the next four years.