Security concerns surface over future site of Charlotte’s emergency hub

Some city leaders worry that it is a safety risk to build a new emergency communications center on a site directly on Statesville Avenue, rather than set back for greater protection.

City Manager Ron Carlee told the council last month the city will build the $78 million communications center on the avenue to “activate” the area, which the city hopes to redevelop.

The original plan was to build the center away from the street, but Carlee said the city did not want to create a “fortress” building. He believes the new building will be a catalyst for development in the area north of uptown.

“What we would have was a suburban campus with a basically low fence around it, which is inappropriate for this kind of urban site,” he said.

The Joint Communications Center will house 911 for police and fire, the city’s 311 service, the Charlotte Department of Transportation’s traffic management system, the police real-time crime center and the county’s emergency operation center. These operations now are spread at different sites.

In case of an emergency, the center would be the hub for coordinating the area’s response.

That decision has prompted meetings between Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police, who want to ensure the building is safe from any attack, and other city officials. CMPD has been meeting with city officials recently about ensuring the windows on the ground floor could withstand a blast.

The city also is considering spending more money on a fire-suppression system that would use chemicals in addition to water sprinklers. That would allow the computer servers in the building to be in operation faster in the event of an accident or attack.

Some elected officials share CMPD’s concerns.

Mayor Dan Clodfelter questioned the city’s decision to bring the building closer to the street during an Oct. 5 meeting.

“Looking at everything that’s in that building, Mr. Manager, wow, what an inviting target,” he said. “I’m sure you’ve got redundancy all over the place and that it’s very, very robust, because we’re putting an awful lot of eggs in that basket.”

Mayor Pro Tem Michael Barnes raised a similar concern.

“I don’t want to use the T-word, but it’s easy to access as opposed to where it was going to be in the middle of the site,” Barnes said.

Barnes also questioned why the building’s cost has increased. Part of the project’s $78 million comes from the capital improvement program, which City Council approved in 2013 after a one-year delay.

During that delay, the city said inflation pushed up the price of the building by $4 million.

The center will be behind the Fire Department’s new headquarters, which opened in April.

The city hopes the area will become revitalized as the Applied Innovation Corridor, which could be home to new start-ups.

Construction on the 82,000-square-foot building could start in early 2016. It will take roughly three years to open the building.

William Haas, the city’s building services division manager, declined to discuss security concerns about having the building on Statesville Avenue.

“Frankly, this is an important building,” he said. “I don’t want to talk about what security features it has and doesn't have.”

In the October meeting, Carlee said the city would not be completely dependent on the center in an emergency.

“There will be other baskets with those same eggs in them at other places,” he said.

Carlee also said some security measures at buildings can create what he called a “false sense of security.”

He continued: “Ultimately, if someone is completely committed to a target, there’s nothing that is invincible.”

This story was originally published November 15, 2015 at 11:12 PM with the headline "Security concerns surface over future site of Charlotte’s emergency hub."