San Luis plans to expand City Hall Building
SAN LUIS, Ariz. – San Luis wants to buy state land to be able to expand its City Hall building.
The city council recently gave its staff the go-ahead to prepare an application to acquire nearly 18 acres of land administered by the state Land Department on the northeast corner of 4th Avenue and Union Street. The parcel is located on the west side of the existing City Hall building, 1090 Union St.
When built in 2007, City Hall was designed to meet the municipal government’s need for office space for 10 years, city officials said.
“We are taking the first step to expand,” Mayor Nieves Riedel said. “This building was designed for 10 years and nearly 16 years have gone by. We are now taking action on the matter.”
San Luis officials estimate the cost of acquiring the land at nearly $750,000, though the city would have to bid on it at a public auction at which competing offers would be accepted.
The city would set aside funds in its fiscal 2024-25 budget for the purchase, were it to submit the winning or only bid, Assistant City Administrator Jenny Torres said.
In other action at its recent session, the council approved an order to acquire rights of way on private land to widen Cesar Chavez Boulevard, at present the only through street linking the east and west sides of the city.
The city has set aside more than $803,000 from a Federal Highways Administration grant and from the city’s general fund toward the purchase of the rights of way on 11 privately owned parcels along the boulevard.
Another $598,000 previously earmarked for road projects the city ended up not doing this year were reallocated by the council to help cover the cost of the right-of-way purchases.
The city previously obtained the rights of way for federal land along the roadway.
The city wants to expand Cesar Chavez from two to four lanes from San Luis Plaza Drive on the west side of San Luis to the point on the east side where the boulevard becomes State Route 195. The widening work will be funded with $33 million allocated by the State Department of Transportation.
City officials says the widening is needed to handle increasingly heavy traffic on Cesar Chavez Boulevard.