Tensions were high at last week’s Mexico City Council meeting as a discussion regarding options for a City Hall/public safety department location was back on the docket.

In a unanimous vote, Mexico City Council members officially selected the former Audrain Medical Center Cancer Center as the future location of City Hall and the Mexico Public Safety Department at the March 23 city council meeting.

The chambers were packed with spectators, as they had been at the previous March 9 meeting, when a resolution authorizing City Manager Bruce Slagle to sign Task Order 3 with Navigate Building Solutions LLC for owner representative services failed to pass.

In addition to the estimated project costs of the three former options — renovating the Cancer Center, constructing a new two-story building, or constructing a new one-story building and renovating the current city hall — Slagle also presented three financial plans at the meeting.

According to previous reporting, the option to renovate the current City Hall was rejected due to cost and concerns regarding city and public safety operations during construction. As a result, the financial plans include two options in which the city would use existing funds as well as a bond for the Cancer Center renovation and a new two-story construction, and one option in which the full amount for a new two-story construction was borrowed.

Financing City Hall/public safety

Slagle said the cancer center renovation is an affordable option.

According to the Mexico City Hall/Public Safety Facility finance plan, amended March 20, 2026, the total program budget for the cancer center renovation is $13,065,900.

This amount includes the renovation and building budget, estimated by Navigate Building Solutions LLC, at $12,830,900. It also includes a $50,000 purchase contingency as well as the demolition and abatement of the existing City Hall. In its final estimate, the city factored in $50,000 in revenue from the sale of the existing site. The total cash contribution from the city would be $5,065,900 — $482,215 from the General Fund, $3,925,651 from the Capital Projects/Use Tax Fund, and $658,034 from the City Hall Building Fund, according to the finance plan.

The project would require an $8 million bond issue, which would be paid with use tax revenue.

“What we’ve already committed out of that funding would leave an estimated remaining balance annually of about $86,000,” Slagle said.

For the second option, which Navigate Building Solutions LLC estimated would cost $18,742,354, the City of Mexico would contribute the same amount from the Capital Projects/Use Tax and City Hall Building Funds as it would in option one as well as $558,669 from the General Fund.

The balance to be funded by bonds would be $13,600,000. The annual estimated deficit balance in this scenario would be $280,434.

“That became an issue of affordability,” Slagle said.

He added that the annual estimated deficit balance in a scenario where the city would finance the whole project and use the reserve the cash on hand to offset other projects would be over $600,000.

“The only thing we can afford to do, I’m thinking, is the Cancer Center,” Larry Webber, city council member, said. “That wasn’t my first choice, it’s still not my first choice, but it seems to be the only choice we can afford.”

Webber had been openly opposed to using the Cancer Center in previous meetings. He, instead, was in favor of researching other buildings or using the lot across the street from 600 N. Coal St. for a new construction. However, Webber said after working with the city manager and others, he agrees that the decision to use the Cancer Center just makes financial sense.

The motion passed in a unanimous vote, as did the acceptance of a Letter of Intent to convey the property with Audrain County. Slagle said while the county owns the property, the Audrain County Commissioners executed a Letter of Intent that extended the property to the city if they chose to pursue the Cancer Center for a City Hall/public safety building.

A new bill regarding the signage of the task order that would allow Navigate Building Solutions LLC to move forward with the project will be brought back to the city council in a future meeting.