“Disappointed” is the only way to describe the room when the bids were opened Tuesday morning for the new Grundy County Law Enforcement Center.
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“Disappointed” is the only way to describe the room when the bids were opened Tuesday morning for the new Grundy County Law Enforcement Center.
The apparent low bidder, Bonhert Construction of Kansas City, submitted a bid of $5,295,000, which is $2 million over the architect’s estimate of $3.2 million. The only other bid received was from Par General Contractors of Chillicothe, which submitted a bid of $5,696,000.
Architect Ken West of ArchitectsWest said the county commission now has the option to reject all bids or to negotiate with the low bidder and see if the project can be constructed within the county’s ability to fund it.
A representative of Bohnert Construction was at the meeting and said that there is room to “do value engineering” which would lower the price. West was not encouraging in his expectations of how far the negotiation would reduce the price.
“I don’t expect to get a million dollars out of it by negotiating,” he said.
West, who used the services of a building contractor in the $3.2 million estimate, said several factors contributed to the high bid, including the time that has passed since the original estimate was given, the recent hurricanes and their effect on the price of materials, fuel prices and the fact that the building plan has changed and grown from about 16,000 or 17,000 square feet to about 30,000 square feet (because the basement will be full instead of partial). West went on to say that changing one of these items would not make a huge difference in the price, but taken together, they apparently do.
West explained that there is nothing “gold-plated” in the 28-bed building and that the most expensive item is the electronic control system, which will run between $500,000 and $1 million. That system must be included, although a different type of system might save some money.
West’s advice to the commission was to table the bids, negotiate with the apparent low bidder and then decide if it can be constructed within the county’s budget. If not, the plans may have to be changed and the project re-bid.
The commission also must determine how the financing could be arranged to help pay for a building that will cost more than expected. They spoke by conference call to Greg Bricker of George K. Baum and Co., concerning the bonding this morning and with a representative of Guaranty Insurance Company. It is possible that the bonds could be insured and will receive a AAA rating, which would lower the interest rate, rather than issue non-rated bonds. The commission was attempting to determine if the length of the repayment period might be extended past the original 20 years that had been planned, to perhaps a 30-year issue.