Columbia City Council approves design elements for I-70/Highway 63 connector, electric rate increase

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)

The Columbia City Council on Tuesday approved the design for a beautification project at the Interstate 70/Highway 63 connector, an electric rate increase and a purchase of land that can be used for a new fire station.

The City Council did not nail down a final price tag for the beautification project, which will be decided at a later date.

The majority of designs will focus on slower-moving and stopped vehicles. Some of those improvements could include:

• A decorative metal railing or fence on the bridge
• A custom city or county seal, street names, graphics or other features
• Decorative lighting on the bridge
• Decorative pattern on the exterior concrete guardrail and bridge facades
• Accent lighting under the bridge or along the bridge facade

Electric rates

The council approved amending the city code to increase residential electric rates. The council voted 5-2 to approve the increase after a two-hour discussion, which saw a number of residents showing displeasure with the measure during the public comment section.

The changes will take affect July 1, and will see a An $8.3 million revenue increase, or 6.9%.

Fire station

The council on Tuesday night also approved the purchase of land in the El Chaparral Subdivision.

About 4.64 acres of land will be purchased for $748,000 and charged to the Capital Improvement Project. The land will be used to build an additional fire station.

The City is looking into building Columbia Fire Station No. 10 at the southeast corner of Broadway and El Chaparral Avenue. The land will be purchased from The Gathering, a nonprofit organization that owns the New Horizons United Methodist Church.

This comes after the Columbia Fire Department and city staff began searching for the property in 2014, stating an additional station is required in order to provide complete coverage for the area. The City Council approved the project in 2015.

The Columbia Fire Department’s goal is to have a response time under four minutes to an emergency anywhere in Columbia. 

Reaching emergencies in a timely matter on the east side of town is difficult for the Columbia Fire Department. 

“One thing we’ve noticed as a fire department is our response times are not where we want them to be out there, “Assistant Fire Chief Jeffery Heidenreich said. “We have a goal of a four-minute response time and because we don’t have a fire station out there the response times are above that.”

If the Columbia Fire Department had a station in east Columbia over the last five years, it would have responded to more than 3,700 calls. 

According to the City, adding the fire station would help lower insurance rates for businesses and home owners in the area. 

“Seconds count in emergencies and this should dramatically reduce our response times in that entire area and so we are very excited about that," Heidenreich said. “You know I look for it to have a very significant impact and produce some very positive outcomes.”

Heidenreich also said the Fire Department worked closely with the City to pick out the land and may use the old building as a temporary spot while the new station is being built. The station will have one Quint Fire Truck and nine people who will work in shifts to ensure there is one chief, engineer and firefighter at all times.