The Lyon County Commission has awarded the bid for the Lyon County District Courthouse remodel project in Yerington to Pellet Construction LLC in the amount of $9.1 million.
The restoration of the building designed by Nevada architect Frederic DeLongchamps and initially built in 1911 then extended in 1936 will be a multi-year undertaking to repair plumbing and cooling needs fix other deterioration.
But while the project is supported in full by the board, District 1 Commissioner Wes Henderson opposed providing County Manager Andrew Haskin blanket authority to sign change orders up to 5% of the total award cost of $9,189,573.
“I’m not going to give anyone a blank check up to $459,000 and what in change,” he said. “I think everyone knows how much I love change orders, but I think change orders need to be brought before the board.”
Haskin asked if there would be a fair amount Henderson would be comfortable with since change orders happen frequently on projects of this magnitude. Henderson referred to facilities director Doug Homestead’s advice.
Homestead recommended at least a $50,000 limit since anything lower potentially meant putting the contractor on regular holds to return to the board for frequent approvals with requests. He referred to examples of what they anticipated would be cost overruns they could discover once the work started and they assessed the needs for the courthouse.
“In today’s age, you’re not going to get anything done for $10,000, especially for that big a project,” Homestead suggested. “We’ve had some problems with the plumbing in that building. They used a lower grade of copper pipe and we’ve had several leaks in the upstairs area. Let’s say they get into it and (the contractor says) it’d be cheaper to replace this pipe rather than just try to patch it.”
Commissioner Robert Jacobson, representing District 4, said he preferred to empower the staff and Pellet Construction to make the decisions as they needed to keep the project moving. He also was in favor of maintaining Comptroller Josh Foli’s language for the agenda item as it was, authorizing the county manager “to sign change orders cumulatively up to 5% of the awarded amount,” observing Foli typically is conservative with such funds.
Commissioner Scott Keller of District 2 also said he would vote for the item.
“When you dive into commercial work, it is expensive, every little problem you have … $50 grand ain’t going to get you in the door,” he said. “And I have faith in you (Haskin). We put you in that position so you can make those choices for us.”
The motion passed 4-1 with Henderson opposed.