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02_Certificate of Zoning Compliance Letter _ April 7, 2020 City of Meridian Planning Department 33 East Broadway Avenue, Suite 102 Meridian, ID 83642 Re: First Responder Training Center 1327 East Watertower Street Meridian, Idaho 83642 Architect’s Project No. 17287.000 Certificate of Zoning Compliance Dear City Planner: The following is a project narrative for the proposed construction of a scenario training building for the Meridian Police Department on their existing training campus located on East Watertower Street in Meridian, Idaho. The current Meridian Police Department campus contains various structures and elements of site infrastructure including drives, landscaping, underground water storage, utilities, parking, and walks. Current structures on site include the Meridian Police Headquarter Building, the K9 building, and Meridian Public Safety Training Center. The facility is to be built on Lot 8, Block 2 of the MURDOCH Sub No 2. The lot is currently zoned C-G, which permits this type of use. The project consists of a new 12,710 square foot building on the existing Meridian Police Department campus. The new building will be a police and fire training building. There will be no fires in or around the building used in the training scenarios. The primary purpose of the building is to provide training scenarios that simulate real potential experiences that police and fire fighters may find in doing their real-life duties. The training scenario exercises will be done in small groups of 5 to 25 people, under direction of the training staff. Training of this nature is very structured and may include lighting controls, projected images, doors designed specifically for breach training, sound/audio, fire training smoke machines, and mannequins/human silhouette props. Within the building may be training prop areas that look like interior spaces including apartments/housing, retail shops, a dry cleaner, generic stores, a bank, a bar/tavern, and a storage room. These areas may include interior and exterior entrances and some glass/polycarbonate glazing on interior and exterior. Props will include interior stairs, closets, bedrooms, toilet rooms (nonfunctional), front doors, and other aspects which one would expect in a house or business building. The building also includes a basement area which has 2 exterior stairs, in different configurations, which are used in training scenarios. This building is not anticipated to be continuously occupied. Functional components contained within the building permanently includes City Planner Page 2 April 7, 2020 equipment storage, user restrooms, user lockers, changing areas, and a central drive aisle for vehicle access. The project site includes paved drives and landscaping to coordinate with the existing development. The building’s exterior has been designed to meet current City design standards while still maintaining the purpose of the building that has specific design requirements. The exterior design consists of standing seam metal siding, an integral color split face CMU base, and standing seam metal roofing. The colors shall closely match the colors of the existing Meridian Public Safety Training Center constructed in 2015. The building will not be mechanically conditioned, therefore there will be no HVAC equipment visible to the outside. The building is fully insulated to assist in maintaining a usable environment. There will be exterior louvers which will allow for ventilation. A trash enclosure is not planned for the building. The building will utilize existing trash and recycling at the adjacent Meridian Public Safety Training Center. Verification of the existing trash enclosure from Republic Services is included in the packet. The existing site parking is not being expanded. There are 140 public (unsecure) parking spots and 136 secure parking spots for a total of 276 parking spots on the site. The parking required for the entire site is 114 parking spots therefore we are in excess of the required parking public parking by 26 cars. With 140 spots there are 7 ADA spots located within the public area which exceeds the requirements. We also need 6 bike stalls for 140 parking spots which are currently present on site. The entire site is currently secured by an existing chain-link or picketed fencing with gate systems that will be modified to secure the new building. Access to the new building is through the primary entrance onto the site from East Watertower Street. The various gates and fencing located near the new building are chain-link and are there to allow access to the training areas and are not for public use. Please accept our application for a Certificate of Zoning Compliance. Contact us immediately if you have any questions or require anything further. Sincerely, CSHQA, Inc. John Maulin, AIA Principal Architect