A martial arts classroom. A television station.
These are just some of the possible long-term uses for the 7,500-square-foot old fire hall on W. Burdick St., which currently sits vacant behind the township and village offices.
At its Dec. 23 meeting, the Oxford Village Council heard two proposals for possible usage of the building.
The first came from Bill Snyder, owner of Master Bill’s Karate. He proposed giving village police officers twice-a-month free law enforcement training – in areas such as hand-to-hand combat and disarming armed people – in exchange for use of the old fire hall to teach his martial arts, boxing and kickboxing classes.
The second came from Don Huegerich, station manager of Oxford Community Television Channel 19.
He said the local cable access station is currently seeking a new location for its studio (which includes office and broadcast facilities) and the old fire hall is “truly a great location for our TV station.”
“We are anxious to see this idea become a reality,” Huegerich told council.
The television station is currently housed inside Oxford High School. However, the school district’s plans to transform the middle school building into the new high school and current high school building into the new middle school don’t include any space in either building for Oxford’s cable access station.
Huegerich said the station has been investigating the old fire hall as a new home since the summer.
“It’s located in the center of the Village of Oxford,” Huegerich said. “The greater community easily identifies it.”
In addition to “ample parking” and “all the special attributes needed for television production,” Huegerich said the old fire hall’s location is perfectly situated within the cable system’s infrastructure and “connections for future communications’ needs are immediately enabled by the site.”
Huegerich noted the old fire hall has “more space than the station actually needs to function,” so they would be willing to share it.
“We’re trying to find other people willing to share space with us to help defray the cost” such as utilities and other building expenses, Huegerich said.
Snyder also indicated he was willing to share the space.
Village President Steve Allen told both men that although council was willing to “entertain” their proposals that night, “a decision cannot be made at this point.”
“One of the things on council’s agenda for the first of the year is to develop a usage plan for that building and a set of guidelines that we can use for granting use in there,” Allen said. “And once we have that put together and adopted, it will be early on in 2004. We’ll invite both of you back to discuss it further. And we’ll entertain both (proposals) at that time and make a decision.”
Councilman Dave Bailey and George DelVigna along with Building and Zoning Official John Elsarelli were appointed to a “usage committee” created that night and charged with studying the possible options for long-term use of the old fire hall and reporting back to council with their recommendations.