MANSFIELD — All six bids for a proposed multiple-floor renovation of the Richland County Courthouse came in lower than than $2.75 million estimate provided by its architect.
Bids for the project, which will largely be funded through a portion of the county’s American Rescue Plan Act, were opened Thursday morning.
Brad Maurer of the Maurer Architectural Design Studio and Craig Christie with Karpinski Engineering have designed the project, which will renovate the first floor of the five-story building, i.e. “L1,” to create new offices for the Richland County Land Bank, a new employee break room and an employee workout room.
It will also renovate the common areas on four of the five floors and nine of the building’s 10 bathrooms. One of the 10 bathrooms was already redone when the second floor, i.e. “L2,” was renovated earlier this year as part of the project to create new offices for the county Clerk of Courts office.
Bids were received from:
— Emhoff Construction from Orrville, $1,598,492
— Equity Construction Solutions from Columbus, $1,901,544
— Adena Corp. from Mansfield, $1,803,048
— Stevens Construction from Marion, $1,747,548
— Robertson Construction from Heath, $1,748,000
— 2K General Co. from Delaware, $1,844,000
Maurer said he was happy with the bids, “but at the same time, a little bit surprised.”
“We based our numbers on a project that we just finished up in the county building. We did add a little bit to that based on the complexity of this project being on multiple levels,” Maurer said.
He and Christie will review the bids and likely return next week to provide a recommendation as to whom the contract should be awarded.
The duo will also be in attendance with commissioners on Tuesday when bids are opened for a project to create a fourth Common Pleas courtroom on the fourth floor, estimated at $750,000.
The lower-than-expected bids opened Thursday will likely mean less funding coming from the county’s capital account to help with the project.
Based upon the $2.75 million estimate, Commissioner Tony Vero had said as much as $1.5 to $2 million would need to come from the capital fund, which is around $11.5 million. Instead, the lower bids could mean just $800,000 to $1 million in capital will be required.
“We’re happy,” Vero said Thursday.
“It’s a combination of ARPA and capital. What we say is ‘non-borrowed dollars,’ ” Vero had said in September. “We are not borrowing money to complete these projects.”
In order to meet ARPA guidelines, money must be appropriated by the end of 2024 and all work completed by the end of 2026.
County administrator Andrew Keller said in September the courtroom project is estimated to take 150 days and the larger renovation that encompasses work on all five floors should take 240 days.
“We expect by the time both projects are complete, we’ll be into 2026,” Keller said.
