CHARLESTON, W.Va. — After hitting now a 60% over budget barrier, The Kanawha County Commission and its team of architects will be working with the lowest-bidding construction company charged with expanding and redesigning the Kanawha County Judicial Building to see whether they can lower the cost.
The commission and Silling Architects will be negotiating with MCS Construction Company, the lowest bidding company for the project, over the next 30 days.
What was originally projected to be a $10 million project at the Judicial Building– which started last year to create more space for a series of new magistrates and circuit judges on the fifth floor– since became a $13.5 million dollar project. It now stands at a $16.2 million dollar endeavor– putting them 60% over budget.
Ben Salango
Kanawha County Commissioner Ben Salango said during their Monday morning meeting addressing the matter that when Silling presented them with three different options for the redesign of the building a year ago, there were no indications being made that it would be costing them this much.
“We were given three options, obviously the option A was the cheapest, option C was what they described as the Cadillac Plan, and when we got the Cadillac Plan we’re actually paying for a Ferrari, as it’s 60-percent higher than what we were told the Cadillac Plan would be,” Salango said.
Silling Architects Project Manager Jeremy Jones said that they were confident that the $13.5 million budget for the project would stand over the competitive bidding process, despite a few additional odds and ends being factored into the equation. However, Jones said even more added stipulations such as site restrictions and night work costs have seemingly shot the budget up much further than what they had initially anticipated.
He said over the 30-day negotiation process with MCS Construction, they want to try and understand why these stipulations are dramatically raising the cost.
“Where are, you know, the large ticket items, how maybe some of the site restrictions, limited lay-down space, and daily clean-up, things of that nature that may not align with our prior estimates,” Jones said.
Lance Wheeler
Commission President Lance Wheeler said, addressing Jones and Silling Architects, that they may have to completely go back to the drawing board on the project.
“What this commission is stating is that what you all have designed and what just came in as the lowest bid, may not be something we feel comfortable moving forward with,” Wheeler said.
Wheeler said they now have two options on moving forward with the project: either they negotiate with the lowest bidder and see if they can work out a new plan they feel comfortable with, or they reject the plan and start over.
He said the second option is unfavorable, but they’ll do it if they have to.
“Now, that is not what we want to do, I’ll be honest with that, it’s not what we want to do, but if that’s what we have to do, because we have a fiduciary responsible to taxpayers to make sure we are taking care of their money, not our money, their money, then we will be forced to do that,” Wheeler said.
Originally, the three options for the expansion and redesign of the Judicial Building included:
.Option A: 5,280 square feet of renovated space, $2.89 million
.Option B: 11,995 square feet of renovated space, $6.85 million
.Option C: 15,557 square feet of renovated space, $9.85 million
It was brought up during Monday’s meeting that if they do have to scrap the hybrid plan of Options B and C that they chose to go with, they could still take Option A into consideration, but Jones said that the meticulous work that has already gone into that hybrid option, and as they have already been signed off on its design, it wouldn’t be feasible to completely scrap it.
Jones also said they had found that Option A didn’t exactly work with the overall design plan.
“At the juncture of schematic design, we found that Option A was not advisable just based on the lack of improvements that it afforded us to be able to pull off,” said Jones.
However, Wheeler said those are issues he doesn’t mind tackling over the next couple of years if it means they don’t have to tackle the issue of debt for the county’s taxpayers. He said they have a duty to make this project affordable for taxpayers and citizens.
“As Commissioner Salango said, we’re not here to build a Ferrari over at that courthouse and make it all fancy and nice for our judges when it’s something that a lot of middle-class and lower-class Americans here in Kanawha County don’t have that type of luxury,” he said.
The commission and Silling Architects plans to negotiate with MCS Construction to try and lower the cost and then meet again on November 4 to either approve or reject the current expansion plan for the Judicial Building.