ABOVE: This county-owned building at 1200 N. State Street in Fairmont was discussed by the Martin County Board of Commissioners on Tuesday.

FAIRMONT– Several building projects were considered by the Martin County Board of Commissioners on Tuesday, including remodeling the county-owned building at 1200 N. State Street in Fairmont for use of county offices.

County Coordinator Scott Higgins said that the building committee has talked about potentially bringing two other county offices, that the county is leasing space for, into the 1200 N. State Street building, which is currently being used for some storage.

Tim Auringer of Oleson and Hobbie Architects shared that they were asked to come up with a proposal for design services, which would include architectural, mechanical and electrical engineering.

“Looking at the space, it is currently underutilized or not utilized,” Auringer said. “We’d be looking at some renovation, demolition and interior partitions,” Auringer said.

He included for the board a concept floor plan which it could look at, which he said was preliminary and showed that the building could be separated into two different department spaces.

“We haven’t met with the particular departments to see what needs they have so this is very basic,” he added.

Auringer said currently the cost is coming in at about $322,000 but that Higgins asked if there was a way to drop the project cost to under $200,000.

“That’s going to be a hard push in my opinion but we do have some areas where I think there could be some dollars with demolition,” Auringer said.

Commissioner Joe Loughmiller asked if there would be any savings if they moved to a more open floor plan with less enclosed office space.

“Most certainly that would help,” Auringer said. “If we’re removing interior partitions…if we start to reduce that, yes we’ll certainly be moving in that direction.”

Commissioner Richard Koons noted that right now the plan has about four enclosed offices but he agreed they could have more open space instead.

“I think it’d be neat to have a bigger, open area that could be joint area for two different entities to be able to use for gatherings if needed,” Koons said.

The board approved a motion to start a conversation with Oleson and Hobbie on working on revamping the building.

County Maintenance Specialist Luke Cyphers also talked about the roof replacement project on the county impound building which was previously looked at by Oleson and Hobbie.

“At that time it was determined between myself and Tim Auringer that we could potentially save or reuse the majority of the existing insulation beneath the metal roof. After meeting with several contractors on site for the viewing, it was determined by more than one contractor that the insulation was brittle and likely not be able to be saved,” Cyphers said.

Since then he, Auringer and Higgins rewrote the document stating that the insulation would be replaced as part of the project.

Auringer said that while the project is out to bid currently, he’d propose an addendum that would include the addition of insulation, which he suspects would have an increased cost of at least $30,000.

“I believe this will be the best application, very similar to what we did a few years back at 1200 N. State Street. A lot of the roof panels were removed off that building and the insulation system was replaced at that time,” Auringer said.

He said that project came in at $18.82 a square foot. Aurinegr also said that the impound building is 7,700 square feet.

“At $20 a square foot, the estimated cost of the reroofing project at the impound facility is going to be $154,000,” Auringer said.

Commissioner Richard Koons made a motion to approve the addendum to replace the insulation as part of the roof replacement project at the county impound building. The motion passed. There is a bid opening date of March 3.

On Tuesday the board also considered the prohbation office remodel project for Department of Corrections (DOC) felony agents.

There has been past discussion of moving the DOC felony agents from 117 N. Main to the security building probation office area. There is a need for four offices which are currently available but would need some some renovations.

Cyphers said he was asked to get a bid for phase one of the remodel project and that the first bid came in a little higher than expected so he was advised by Higgins to put in separate bids from each contractor, including flooring and electrical.

“It is slightly time sensitive with county probation funding due in May,” Cyphers said..

The board approved a motion to accept a bid from Paradis Construction for the walls and a bid from Rickway Carpeting for the floors and DeWar Electric for the electrical.

Finally, the board heard from IT Director Jeramie Jones regarding the courthouse door access lock system. He said since 2017 there have been no updates and that the hardware has been failing and some have been shipped out to New York for repairs, at a cost of $2,200 per lock.

“We’re just looking toward going something more modern,” Jones said. “This is something that’s required by the BCA on the LEC side,” he added.

The board approved a schematic design for a new lock system from Oleson and Hobbie in the amount of $25,600.