Council to re-address improvements to Bay-Hendricks Park after the bids come in higher than money available
Monday night, the Jay Council tabled the Bray-Hendricks Park renovation plans after recent bids from several different construction companies came in much higher than anticipated.
About two years ago, the park renovation was estimated to cost around $4 million. The town has $2.5 million from grants and other sources and Jay Operations Manager Eric Seib said the town is in the process of obtaining the other $1.5 million.
“We have grant opportunities of up to $1 million,” said Seib. “We just have to find cost savings in the current design to get us back to $4 million.”
Bids from Panhandle Construction, Chavers Construction and C.W. Roberts Contracting each came in between $6,083,732 and $6,847,520. Seib presented council members an itemized spreadsheet at the meeting to compare Dewberry’s estimates to actual bid amounts.
Jay Mayor Shon Owens said he was embarrassed and feels that although the town council bears the brunt of the shortfall, he feels like, as mayor, he failed by not paying attention.
Owens said the recently increased cost of construction along with the town’s lack of a clear picture of what the cost expectation would be, are in his opinion, the two biggest reasons for the underestimation.
“In my opinion, it’s our responsibility to have those numbers in place,” said Owens. “We know we are going to have to regroup with the engineers and eliminate some of the things we wish for in the park and get back to the basics of what’s needed to make the park successful with the upgrade we can afford to do.”
The amphitheater, additional basketball courts, football fields, tennis courts may have to eliminated for now, with the anticipation that down the road, the town can find funding and complete them in phases.
Owens says it’s time to regroup with Dewberry engineers, determine the necessities, determine the site plan itself that the park has to have in place and move forward with what the town can afford. He said they will work on how other components can be phased in later.
“We are definitely disappointed,” said Owens. “We spent six months without a lot of movement. It’s disheartening as a council, but we can’t have any more control over scheduling and movement, we’ve just got to get back with it.”
The town has been utilizing Dewberry Engineering for several years for different projects and are pleased so far.
“Dewberry is a good firm, they’ve done the town a good job, Crystal (Weatherington, with Dewberry Engineering who works with the town) has done a fantastic job,” said Owens. “My only concern is that, on projects like this, we should have requested more assistance on Crystal’s behalf to make sure things are moving in the right direction. She may have needed a little more support.”
Referring to the setback as a ‘little hiccup’, Owens is ready to return to the drawing board and make some tough changes to meet the challenges of building a park that will meet the needs of the community and be something the town can build on for years to come.
“At this point, we need to find a way to provide a good park for the community and the recreational groups,” said Owens.
