On Thursday, the council announced its purchase in October of Henderson House, with the intention of having all its staff in one place.
As it stands, employees are split across three buildings — an earthquake-prone Forth St premises and two leased sites in Don St.
The move will spell the end of the Forth St site, which includes three connected buildings and previously belonged to Southland County Council.
There is optimism the move will prove cost-effective for the organisation.
"Having staff in one council-owned office building will mean there is a saving when we stop paying the leases on our two Don St offices," council chief executive Cameron McIntosh said.
Built in 1990, Henderson House is in Invercargill’s Kelvin St and will be refitted to the tune of $15.75 million in accordance with long-term plan budgets. Its purchase price was exclusive of GST.
The new site has an occupancy limit of 200 but just how many people it will staff is to be decided.
No decision has been made on the future of the Forth St premises, and a timeframe could not be given on when staff would be moved.
The changes come as the Southland District Council is proposing the region’s four councils morph into two unitary authorities.
Mr McIntosh said the new building did not affect its goal of seeing that happen.
The council has also explored shifting its office into the district but decided against it because of costs and challenges attracting new staff.
— Matthew Rosenberg, Local democracy reporter
— LDR is local body journalism co-funded by RNZ and NZ On Air.
