PANAMA CITY, Fla. (WMBB) — Massalina Complex includes several city-owned and operated workspaces. The Maintenance Complex has several buildings, some of which have been renovated since Hurricane Michael.
But, the Equipment Maintenance Facility is still in the waiting process for upgrades.
“This is a facility that repairs and maintains our fleet for our solid waste, our street maintenance, police, fire, and all of our rolling stock of vehicles,” Assistant City Manager Jared Jones said.
While the building did suffer damages from Michael, it was deemed a safe structure.
“It has some damage to it, but it’s not structurally compromised and at this point, the city contracted with a third-party engineer to have it evaluated, they deemed it safe,” Jones said.
Even though no major repairs have been done, the city said they had the building evaluated and made small changes to the facility.
“They did some roof work and they did they put up a temporary wall which has since been replaced and reinforced at that and our third-party engineer’s recommendation but again, we pride ourselves on being able to provide a safe and healthy work environment for our employees,” Jones said.
The city does have plans to repair the damages in the near future.
“The city has just settled with our insurance company, just since last summer, we’ve been working concurrently in that in advance of that settlement to get some of these projects ready,” Jones said. “And I think you’re seeing this as a result of that is we’ve got the settlement and we’re able to move forward now with these repairs.”
Jones said the city expects the repairs to begin early next year.
“Bid documents are almost complete for the repairs to the facility and those bid documents should be on the street after the new year,” Jones said.
He added the office, administrative building, and part and supply rooms are still in use.
City officials said repairs will begin immediately once the bid is selected.
