St Augustine Water Plant building considered for state grant

Historic City News learned that the request from the City of St. Augustine for $350,000 in state funds to rehabilitate the structural system of the Waterworks building, was one of 66 grant applications considered by the members of the Florida Historic Commission when they convened last week in Tallahassee.

The Waterworks site is adjacent to Davenport Park at the intersection of San Marco Ave. and May St. The building, which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, was built in 1897 and housed the city’s first water pumping station. After the opening of a new pumping station on West King St. in 1928, the building underwent a rehabilitation designed by architect F.A. Hollingsworth and was used as a little theatre and home of the St. Augustine Arts Club. Its most recent use as a community center was for the St. Augustine Garden Club until it was deemed unsafe because of needed rehabilitation in 2005.

In its deliberations, members of the Florida Historic Commission reviewed, discussed and then ranked each of the applications after consultation with Bureau of Historic Preservation staff who performed technical reviews of each proposed project. The list of projects recommended for funding and the dollar amount designated for each will be part of the 2015-2016 state budget considered by the Legislature when it meets in March and April.

For all requests to be filled, the Legislature would have to fully fund the entire list, which has not happened in recent years. Rather, the funding level approved by the Legislature is applied to projects based on the rankings by the Florida Historic Commission with funds being awarded until depleted, usually leaving low ranked projects without any funds. So, a ranking close to the top of the list greatly increases the chance of being funding. For all approved projects to be fully funded, the Legislature will need to appropriate $13 million.

So when the Commission announced the ranking for the applications, the city’s Waterworks project was ranked fifth which nearly guarantees is likelihood of being funded and work on the preservation project will continue on its path of complete rehabilitation and eventual reintroduction to the community as a usable facility.

The city’s grant application will require a fifty-percent match to cover the entire cost of the work, projected to be $525,000. The goal is to create a stable building shell ready for planning the next phase which is its adaptive use.

This grant is the second received from the state for the project. Last year, the city applied for and received a $50,000 grant, which required a matching support of $25,000 cash and $25,000 in-kind services. The total $100,000 will be used to finance stabilization and repair of two brick walls, archaeological research including ground penetrating radar, and removal of non-significant features of the interior.

Attending the Commission meeting when the announcement was made were City Commissioner Nancy Sikes-Kline, City Manager John Regan, and Jenny Wolfe, Historic Preservation and Special Projects Planner for the city.

The list of projects considered for funding included three others from St. Augustine: Trinity Episcopal Church of St. Augustine for its exterior restoration project was ranked 14th; the Sisters of St. Joseph, Inc. for stain glass window repair was ranked 28th; and Forward March, Inc. for restoration of the Hamblen House was ranked 33rd.