Map courtesy of city of Vestavia Hills
This map shows areas of Vestavia Hills that grew more than 1% in population from 2021 to 2023.
Vestavia Hills City Manager Jeff Downes on Monday night presented the City Council with a condensed list of capital plan improvement priorities for the eastern part of the city that gets the cost down from $54 million to $37.5 million.
The new list also puts a proposed addition to Fire Station No. 4 in Liberty Park at the top of the list in sequential order, with the goal of getting construction started in fiscal 2026.
The need for expanded fire service in Liberty Park is pretty clear, Downes said. Response times to Fire Department calls in Liberty Park on average take 8 minutes and 53 seconds, compared to 7 minutes and 53 seconds for the city as a whole, Downes said. And there has been a 140% increase in calls in Liberty Park and the eastern part of the city since 2011, he said.
The demand for fire and emergency medical service in Liberty Park is only going to increase with several major developments underway, including 545,000 square feet of apartments, a 100-room hotel, 108,000 square feet of cross-laminated timber offices, 100,000 square feet of retail and more than 1,300 homes, fire Chief Marvin Green has said.
People are going to start moving into some of the apartments in the next few weeks, Downes said. “All of this stuff is putting pressure on us.”
Green’s proposal is to add onto Station No. 4 in Liberty Park and add more equipment and manpower there gradually, each of the next three fiscal years.
Rendering courtesy of city of Vestavia Hills.
Rendering of proposed addition at Fire Station No. 4.
The dire need, combined with the fact that the city already has the land and schematic plans for an addition at Station No. 4, make that a good place to start with capital projects, Downes said. The initial estimate for the fire station addition was $6 million, but that now has been narrowed down to $5.7 million.
Downes has identified a potential source for that money — the city’s emergency reserves. There currently are more than $21 million in reserves, and the city’s recommended reserve is 90 days worth of operating expenses, which currently is about $17.1 million, Downes said. That means the city could pull $3.9 million from reserves and still have the recommended amount, he said.
The remaining funds for the fire station addition likely could come from the city’s capital fund balance, which as of Sept. 30 stood at $10.6 million, Downes said. A lot of that money is already allocated for fire engines, police cars and infrastructure for Liberty Park, but there likely would be at least $1.5 million to complete the fire station addition, he said.
The other capital project proposed for fiscal 2026 is construction of a new road onto land next to the Sicard Hollow Athletic Complex where the city wants to build a police substation and training center, library branch, and new park maintenance and public works facility.
That access road and associated infrastructure work is expected to cost about $1.4 million. The city plans to seek a grant to cover all of that cost and believes it has a good chance to receive it, Downes said. The grant request must be submitted by July, and the money could come in the fall, he said.
FISCAL 2027
City officials also have made some proposed changes to other capital projects to cut costs, getting the estimated cost for a police substation and training center down from $16.4 million to $14.6 million, the cost of the library branch down from $9.2 million to $7.2 million, and the cost of a converting the baseball and softball fields at Liberty Park to artificial turf from $11.3 million to $7.3 million, Downes said.
Downes would like to proceed with all of those projects in fiscal 2027, along with a $1.3 million new park maintenance and public works facility. The total cost for those capital projects in 2027 would be an estimated $30.4 million.
Downes said he has some ideas about how to fund those projects but isn’t ready to make a recommendation yet until they firm up some of those plans.
He does, however, want to ask the council to hire a construction manager to handle the work on the “Pine Ridge” property next to the Sicard Hollow Athletic Complex and a fundraising consultant for the library project.
Downs also said he plans to ask the council to approve $175,000 from the city to help complete construction of the veterans memorial at Altadena Valley Park and money to heat the pool at Wald Park during the cooler months. In February, the estimated the cost of heater project was $171,000. The veterans memorial already has $250,000 of committed funds from outside the city, Downes said.
Downes also said he believes that, by not touching the general fund to cover capital projects, the expected growth in general fund revenues should help cover future increases in operating expenses associated with the new capital projects, such as paying new firefighters.
Councilman George Pierce said he believes public safety should be the priority for capital projects, and believes pulling money from emergency reserves is reasonable to cover a fire station addition because the city could have serious situations if they do not address that need.
Downes noted that while the growth in Liberty Park is costing the city money to provide services, the city also can plan on significant increases in revenue with the growth in Liberty Park — in areas such as property taxes and sales taxes. All those people moving into Liberty Park likely will be buying groceries and other goods and services in the commercial sectors there, he said.
Councilwoman Kimberly Cook said she thinks Downes’ plan makes a lot of sense. It’s a phased approach and starts with the most important priorities, she said.’
“I do think that it’s important for us to use these new revenues that are coming from The Bray’s commercial development to address the infrastructure needs,” Cook said. “If we’re getting the revenue [from that part of town], we have to provide the services [to those residents].”
Councilman Paul Head asked why Downes wants to wait to proceed with the projects on the land next to the Sicard Hollow Athletic Complex. “Let’s get it all done,” he said.
Downes said while he has a good idea what those projects will cost, he doesn’t want to build a final budget to potentially borrow money until they have a construction manager develop more firm cost estimates and have a better idea how much money could be raised to assist with the library project and how much sales tax revenues will increase with growth in Liberty Park.
Projects that were no longer mentioned in the short-term priority list were a $1 million playground at the new library branch and a second fire station in Liberty Park or a new fire station at Patchwork Farms. Another fire station had been estimated to cost $7.5 million to build.
