An entourage of county officials and representatives from PayneWest Insurance toured the Flathead County Agency on Aging facility on Friday to begin addressing short-term fixes for a number of safety concerns at the rented building on Kelly Road.

Lisa Sheppard, who began work as the Agency on Aging director last November, recently forwarded a list of concerns to County Administrator Mike Pence after discussing them with the Area IX Advisory Council on Aging.

The building has housed the Meals on Wheels and congregate meal programs, along with a variety of other services for senior citizens, for more than a decade, even though the space originally was deemed temporary.

Once used as an auction house, the building is owned by Alpine Business Center, a partnership that includes Charles and Mickey Lapp and other partners, who lease it to the county for a little more than $52,000 a year.

The county invested around $50,000 to retrofit the barn-like structure to accommodate aging services. Agency programs have grown through the years, though, and now are squeezed for space.

The county commissioners are making plans to build a new facility on a yet-to-be-determined site on county land, but that could take up to two years. Right now the county is asking the city of Kalispell to use the city’s Community Development Block Grant slot to pursue a $450,000 grant.

Until a plan is worked out for a new building, the county’s risk management committee is trying to figure out a way to correct the deficiencies as inexpensively as possible.

“If it takes two years for a new building, we don’t want to spend a ton of money,” county Human Resource Officer Tammy Skramovsky said. “These really expensive things [temporary improvements] are scaring me. It’s taxpayer money.”

The bottom line, Sheppard said, is that the building “isn’t a good fit for what we do.”

Health and safety issues have to be dealt with even in the interim, said Commissioner Cal Scott, who was part of the tour group.

County Administrator Mike Pence agreed. “Safety is a high enough priority that we’re going to fix things,” he said.

That said, the county is sorting out what its responsibility is as the tenant and what the building owner is responsible for.

Sheppard said she’s had conversations with Charles Lapp about some of the potential fixes, such as installing snow brakes on the steep metal roof to prevent big chunks of ice and snow from sliding off, and drainage issues in the parking lot.

Lapp said he has gotten a proposal from a contractor to put up the snow brakes. He noted, however, that he’s still waiting to hear from the county about what needs to be done.

“Nobody from the county has talked to me,” he said. “I’d love to sit down with the commissioners or Mike Pence or whoever and discuss whatever they want about the building. As far as a landlord-tenant relationship, my tenant has never contacted me about fixing anything.”

Lapp acknowledged he’s had conversations with Sheppard, and in the past had some discussions with former AOA Office Administrator Wes Hulla, but they’re not the decision-makers, he said.

Lapp defended the structural integrity of the building.

“That’s a good building,” he said. “We conducted business there 10 years [before the county leased it] and there’s nothing wrong with the building. It’s not a bad place. I can’t deal with the other issues” of whether it’s the best fit for the Agency on Aging.

Lapp further said he has responded to a number of requests for improvements through the years, such as building entryway roofs over doorways. He said he knows there has been an ongoing problem with water seeping under an overhead garage door toward the back of the building and is trying to find the best way to correct the problem.

Many of the agency’s difficulties aren’t with the building itself but with the way the space is configured inside. For example, seniors must walk through the food storage area to reach information and assistance in four offices at the back of the building. There’s also no climate control in the commodities storage area and temperatures have exceeded the recommended 50- to 70-degree range for food used in the meals programs.

Wheelchair access to the restrooms is another concern because of tight spaces and a 90-degree turn required for wheelchairs. There’s no immediate fix for this, the group agreed. Relocating the restroom doors would be an expensive project.

Painting the floor in the kitchen and dining areas with a sealant is a priority because county health inspectors routinely have cited the need for the floors to be smooth and easily cleaned. County officials may consider getting paint with a rough texture to make it less slick for elderly clients, volunteers and employees.

The county is looking at a temporary fix for the electrical system so power cords wouldn’t run across the floor under rugs. Skramovsky said she has seen claims come through for “trip and fall” incidents.

Lapp said he got a bid for electrical work about six years ago and offered to make improvements.

“The county said no because they were going to be there only short-term,” Lapp said.

At the end of the tour, the group decided to have county Maintenance Superintendent Jed Fisher get cost estimates for various improvements. If at all possible, employees in the four offices in the food storage area would be relocated to space in the front offices.

Another idea is to consider leasing office space in an adjacent building also owned by Alpine Business Center.

Lapp mentioned the additional building last August when he talked to the commissioners about the lease agreement. At that point the asking price was $650 a month and the county could remodel it as they’d see fit.

Depending on how much it will cost to make temporary improvements at the AOA building, several county officials wondered if it would be cheaper to rent the additional space until the new facility is built.

The county currently rents the AOA building on a month-to-month basis for $4,360 a month, or 60 cents per square foot. That’s about a third less than the going rate of $1 per square foot per month for commercial office space, Lapp said.

Features editor Lynnette Hintze may be reached at 758-4421 or by email at lhintze@dailyinterlake.com.