Controversial Urbandale Shelter House Gets OK from City Council

After several months of debate, Urbandale city leaders last week agreed to proceed with construction of a shelter house in at an additional cost of $15,000.

The Urbandale City Council last week approved spending $1.877 million to build the shelter — up from the proposed $1.862 million, the Des Moines Register reports. The added cost will use a burnished block inside instead of traditional concrete block.

According to an earlier Patch story, the city will be getting a $1.8 million tornado shelter and community center for about $1 million.

About 42 percent of the cost is being covered by the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the state of Iowa. Urbandale will receive about $668,178 from FEMA and the state will pay $89,900 into the project.

Councilman Tom Gayman agreed the shelter, a house built in 1958, is in need of repair. He told council members last week that he had offered a number of alternatives to get it done, but none were taken to heart.

“I find $2 million for a shelter house to be an outlandish amount of money to spend,” he said in the Register.

Included in the city’s construction proposal are three added features: a roof for the east patio, a gas fireplace and folded panels with the ability to divide the room.

The current shelter was donated to the city in 1974, the newspaper said. It needs a new roof, windows and electrical upgrades. The new building will be more than double the size of the existing structure at 5,800 square feet. It also will serve as a tornado shelter, as well as having a kitchen, restrooms, an open interior and storage space.