RUMFORD — The Select Board will hold a special town meeting Wednesday, July 30, about construction of an office/garage facility for the Parks and Recreation Department.

The meeting will take place at 5 p.m. in the Rumford Falls Auditorium at Town Hall.

Before agreeing to the special town meeting, the board declared that a critical circumstance exists because the town wants to have the 60 x 100-foot pre-fab metal garage constructed on Hosmer Lane by the end of the year.

“Right now, I do not have a suitable garage facility for the Parks and Recreation Department. Period,” Town Manager George O’Keefe said.

The flood of December 2023 resulted in an estimated $2 million damage to the 15 Lincoln Ave. recreation park’s office, equipment and garage.

As recently as six months ago, O’Keefe said they had bids telling them a new building would be a $3 million project. Following three workshops by the select board with recreation and other officials, that figure has come way down to just over $1 million.

O’Keefe said the latest project estimate was $1,082,000 and he expects another reduction because there were components of the HVAC (heating, ventilation, and air conditioning) system that they didn’t need. “We did not want them to air condition the garage.”

He said that cash on hand in the accounts of the town is about $879,000, “but only about $604,000 can be reappropriated by the town to this project, if they wish to do so. All of that is sitting in the Parks Department capital fund to support its programs and facilities. I am recommending that people of the town consider using parks’ capital funding into a parks’ building.”