Portage is borrowing $5.8 million, primarily to pay for police and fire vehicles and paving.
The City Council approved issuing the general obligation bond on Tuesday.
Among the purchases is a new ladder truck ordered last year for the fire department. The truck is expected to be delivered next year.
“We know it’s expensive; however, our current ladder truck is 26, 27 years old,” Fire Chief Chris Crail said.
The truck it’s replacing isn’t expected to pass certification soon, so it will have to put it out of service until the new one arrives, Crail said.
“It is an extremely important asset to have for the city,” especially in a city with as many industrial buildings as the city has, he said.
The city scrambled to order the fire truck last year, arranging for the Redevelopment Commission to provide financial backup just in case the truck arrived before the City Council had money for it.
The new truck will have an older engine style, designed before new emissions rules took effect, Crail said. That avoids uncertainty about what issues the new generation of motors might have.
Police Chief Michael Candiano said the need for new police cars is dire.
“After about four years, they become money pits,” he said. “We barely have any funds to repair cars at this point.”
“We’re at the point now where if a car breaks over the next two months, we can’t fix it,” Candiano said.
“They just don’t last as long as they used to,” he said, and the new technology used in the cars means street department mechanics can’t fix them easily now.
A resident complained at a public hearing on the bond issue Tuesday about seeing a Portage police car in Grand Rapids and insisted it wasn’t a Portage, Michigan, car.
If a Portage, Indiana, police car was in Grand Rapids and not for training or other official business, the officer to whom the car was assigned could be subject to discipline, Candiano said.
He defended the take-home car policy. Just last Saturday, Candiano said, he was off duty but near a crash at Willowcreek and Central when officers weren’t in the vicinity, so he responded. After that, he responded to another call. “We don’t turn in overtime for things like that. That’s just having cars out in the community,” he said.
Not all departments have take-home cars. Some use them 24 hours a day. “When was the last time you saw a pretty decent-looking Chicago cop car?”
Cars used 24/7 aren’t maintained as well as a car assigned to an officer responsible for the vehicle’s condition, he said.
“Running a car for 24 hours a day, you’re going to pay either way. You’re either going to burn out a car in two years or you’re going to wear out a car in four or five years,” he said.
When Portage police are done with the car, it gets passed along to other users. First, the patrol division uses the car, then the detective bureau, then it can get passed along to the reserves or other city departments. By the time the reserve division gets a car, it’s in pretty bad shape, Candiano said.
In other action Tuesday, the council voted 6-1 to rezone a property for multifamily housing instead of office and commercial use.
The property is accessible only through the new Rivertrace subdivision, Planning and Development Director Tom Cherry said. Without fronting a major road like Willowcreek Road or U.S. 6, office and commercial use didn’t seem a logical use.
The property owner wanted to rezone the land without having a development in mind.
Councilwoman Penny Ambler, R-4th, said she voted against the rezoning because she opposes additional housing developments in the city, fulfilling a campaign promise.
Doug Ross is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.