Lansing's Mayor Virg Bernero is putting the gears in motion to make sure his successor walks into office with a plan to move City Hall to a new building downtown.
On Tuesday he put out a request for proposals asking developers to send in their plans to both move City Hall to a new location and redevelop the current building.
Bernero says the building is in such disrepair the city can't afford to let it go any longer. He says the list of issues keeps getting longer, now including a crumbling roof and fire code updates.
"When it rains water is coming in the window," Bernero added.
In all he says the building needs more than $50 million in repairs.
"The longer we wait we're going to be putting good money after bad into this old building, it makes no sense," he said.
That's why Bernero is trying to get a plan to build a new city hall before he leaves office. Plus he says it would be too big of an undertaking to leave for a new mayor.
"You're going to be able to take the proceeds from this sale and put that into the new City Hall which is a better deal for taxpayers than to stay here and refurbish it."
Moving City Hall isn't a new idea. Last year Bernero proposed relocating to the vacant Lake Trust building on South Washington. He still isn't ruling that option out, but says he wants something in place before the end of the year.
"This building is going to collapse on itself so we can't do nothing, that's not one of the options," Bernero said.
The Mayor is giving developers until mid-August to submit their plans to the city.
