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Plan for teen club gets jolt Photo by Bob Pennell Tom Cole, director of Kids Unlimited, stands on the gutted first floor of the former Wells Fargo bank building at Front and East Main streets in Medford. The second floor of the building must be retrofitted to make it safer in case of an earthquake before the VIBES teen club can open. Earthquake retrofit required By DAVID PRESZLER Plans to open a teen dance club and activity center in downtown Medford have hit a snag. Kids Unlimited, a nonprofit organization, had planned to reopen VIBES in the former bank building at Front and East Main streets in early January. Those plans were delayed when city building safety officials told Kids Unlimited that the building would need earthquake reinforcement upgrades before it could open as a public gathering place. "After we got into the facility, we were informed about a seismic code that had been overlooked," said Tom Cole, Kids Unlimited's director. The work could cost as much as $25,000, and Cole is searching for additional funding to cover it. He secured $65,000 in December to open the center; the city of Medford and Jackson County each committed $25,000 and the Carpenter Foundation donated $15,000. Cole said the $65,000 in initial funding helped secure a five-year lease and did include money for unexpected expenses. "We weren't prepared for seismic," he said. "We'd hate for the project to fall short, but we didn't anticipate this." Cole hopes the work will begin next week and the club will open by the last weekend in February. In addition to the dance club, Kids Unlimited plans to use the building to house a variety of activities for teens and children. The idea is that revenue from the dance club will support those other programs. Cole said he is working with four or five groups interested in leasing space there. A significant amount of work has already been done on the inside of the building, which formerly housed First Interstate Bank and Wells Fargo. Cole and about 25 volunteer parents and teens spent about three weeks over Christmas break working in the building. "We basically had to do demolition on this whole area," said Cole, motioning to the gutted first floor that was once the bank's main lobby. The first level will be the dance floor, and Cole has already gotten help from Land Mine Productions to design its layout. He's also working out how to make the space as functional as possible. "We're trying to make it multipurpose, yet feasible for our purpose on the weekend," he said. The seismic issues will have to be resolved first. City officials did an early evaluation with Kids Unlimited before it leased the space and determined that it would be suitable for the dance club. After the group took possession, a more thorough inspection was done because the building was changing uses, from an office use to a place for public gathering. Chris Reising, the city's building safety director, said that when a building changes to a more hazardous use (meaning more people are there), it must be brought up to current code. That includes seismic reinforcements to minimize damage in case of an earthquake. "We're talking about 500 kids in the place," said Reising. "We want to make sure it's right." Reising said such retrofits are fairly common on older buildings and have been done on several in the downtown area. Essentially, the second floor and the roof of the building need to be more firmly attached to its concrete exterior walls. The most critical work needs to be done on the second floor and must be completed before the dance club can open. The city has given Kids Unlimited more time to have the roof repairs made. Cole said the second-floor work could be finished in as little as a week and he expects the rest of the remodeling to go smoothly and quickly. Today's Edition : News | Sports | Business | Weather | Tempo | Classifieds Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 2000, Medford, Oregon USA