Tualatin residents can now access a wide range of City services from the convenience of a single, brand new facility located at the corner of S.W. Herman Street and S.W. 108th Avenue.
The final touches to the new Tualatin City Services building are being wrapped up this month, even as City employees from Public Works, Community Development, Parks Maintenance and the Municipal Court are already enjoying their new home. The approximately $8 million project broke ground in February 2020 and managed to power through the COVID-19 pandemic all the way to substantial completion in February of this year. Over the past few months, City staff from those four departments have transferred their operations over to the new building from their previous stations at the Tualatin Police Department, City offices on Martinazzi Avenue and former rented space.
“It makes it a one-stop shop for permits and easy access for the community,” said City Maintenance Services Division Manager Clay Reynolds. “It puts all these people together, it makes it easy to get hold of everybody and meet with people, and it just works really well for efficiency’s sake.”
The project has been in the works since 2018, when planning for the new building got underway. Scott | Edwards Architecture designed the single-story structure, which was built by general contractor Bremik Construction.
At the same time, remodeling work is also finishing up at the existing City Offices building, which hosts the Tualatin Library, as well as the finance department and City administration. Those departments will have more space, while the Municipal Court has moved out of the police department building, where it was taking up a conference room normally used for officer meeting and training activities.
“It enables finance and administration to get back together and it saves on rental space,” Reynolds said. “It benefits everybody in a lot of ways.”
Assistant City Manager Megan George said that both city staff and the public had input into the design of the building. Now that COVID-19 case rates are dropping and vaccinations are on the rise, the City is hoping to soon have residents view the public areas of the new facility.
“We’re planning a ribbon cutting or open house in the future when it is safer to do that and bring people together,” George said. “We’re excited to have folks come in and view the public rooms.”
