Bid Submissions Opened For Future Belmont County Animal Shelter
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ST. CLAIRSVILLE - Bid submissions were open for the future Belmont County Animal Shelter on Tuesday afternoon.
During its rescheduled meeting on Tuesday afternoon, the Belmont County Commissioners opened with six construction companies submitting bids.
StoneMile Group LLC, Grae-Con Construction, United Construction Company, DiMarco Construction Company, Fleeher Contracting LLC, and Jarvis Downing and Emch Inc. Construction Services all submitted bids for the project.
StoneMile Group LLC was the first bid opened at $8,523,485 with an alternative of $235,000. Grae-Con Construction's bid was $8,224,448, with an alternate of $342,000. United Construction Company submitted a bid at $8,863,000 with an alternate $415,000. DiMarco Construction Company's bid was $8,740,000, with an alternate of $158,900. Jarvis Downing and Emch Inc. Construction Services submitted a bid for $8,650,000 with an alternate bid of $350,000.
Commissioner Jerry Echemann said the alternative section of the bids were for the possible addition of a metal roof on the new facility.
"A lot of bids do have alternates, but the majority does not. It's not really uncommon to have alternates," Echemann said.
He added the purpose of having an alternative bid is for something not required in the project, though could possibly be added.
Echemann said the project architect will be TC Architects.
Vice president Susan Allen said TC Architects frequently works with animal shelters to build custom structures to work specifically for each shelter.
Allen added the new shelter will be 14,000 square feet.
"It has three separate pods of animal holding areas. Each one of those three pods are broken down into three smaller sections. Animals stay much more comfortable and calm when they’re in smaller groups," Allen said. "We actually have a fourth pod for the future planned on site if the county ever needs that."
She added one of the things the pods feature is a lot of natural light to help the animals stay within their circadian rhythms, making sure they understand when it’s nighttime or daytime.
"Hopefully, the new facility will help more people coming to the facility, so we can adopt out those dogs and cats, so that you don’t need the fourth pod," Allen said.
Echemann added the new facility will be located on the property of the former Belmont County Habilitation Center.
Commissioner J.P. Dutton said the project has been in the queue for roughly four years and he is glad to see headway being made on it.
He added the current facility, which is from the 1980s, has been used heavily 24/7 since its opening.
Dutton said the new building will have better airflow and amenities for the animals than the current building.
"Frankly, it’s amazing because I mean you could look at local news stories over the last several years and look at a lot of instances where animal shelters in the Ohio Valley have either had to close their doors temporarily for two reasons: one is overcrowding, and the other is for infection, basically, particularly parvo, and we have not had to do that in Belmont County, and that’s not because the facility had anything to do with that. Frankly, it’s in spite of the facility that our staff has worked that hard to keep our building operating the way that they have," Dutton said. "I think a tremendous thank you to the individuals there for continuing on a daily basis to work through a facility that’s not ideal, and that’s why we’re kind of excited to move forward with this project."
With bids opening, the commissioners will give Allen the bid requests for review and recommendation before the board determines who will be awarded the bid in the near future.