Investigations into finding a future Queenstown base for the Queenstown Lakes District Council will continue, and it is possible staff will have to move twice in the coming years.
In a report about council accommodation to tomorrow's full council meeting, corporate services general manager Meaghan Miller recommends a special project be delegated to chief executive Adam Feeley to address and act on short-term requirements for relocating the staff at the Gorge Rd premises and the emergency operations centre and evaluate long-term solutions for a single council building.
In May, the Otago Daily Times reported the council's Gorge Rd site, which accommodates 66 staff, was deemed not fit for purpose. At 35% of building code, it is at the minimum earthquake safety level.
Further, the lease on a building at Shotover St, which houses 82 staff over two levels, will expire in July 2016.
After that, it is likely the council will be able to extend the lease on only one level, housing 58 staff. A potential lease on a Church St building would cater for the remaining 24 staff.
A lack of suitable buildings to house all staff under one roof in the CBD means it is possible the council will move to the Frankton Flats.
In her report, Ms Miller said the council had three options: do nothing; identify both a short to medium-term and a long-term solution; or retain the status quo until a long-term solution was found.
The key issue with doing nothing, or remaining in the Gorge Rd premises for the foreseeable future, was that those options did not address concerns about the building's relative lack of structural integrity and would not remove the council or the chief executive from their health and safety obligations to staff and the public.
While the second, preferred, option had the disadvantages of potentially requiring two office moves - one ''soon'' and another when, or if, a permanent single office for all staff was identified - and the transfer of some parts of the council to Frankton Flats, vacating the Gorge Rd site would address the critical issues.
''Moving out of Gorge Rd would eliminate any question about both the adequacy and timeliness of council's response to the issues raised by the engineering report,'' the report said.
