Wayne Community College board talks project slowdown
By Phyllis Moore
Published in News on September 28, 2016 9:57 AM
Requests from the state to make the proposed Advanced Manufacturing Center more energy efficient sparked debate Tuesday night among the Wayne Community College board of trustees, who were concerned about potential slowdowns to the project.
The former Cooper Bussmann building on Dixie Trail is being converted into a hub for specialized training, with plans to house the Advanced Manufacturing Center as well as Wayne WORKS, or Wayne Occupational Readiness Keys for Success.
County and college officials had anticipated the Connect NC Bond, passed on the March 15 ballot, would be the answer to pushing the project forward.
The commission in February made a change in the lease to ensure eligibility to receive the state bond funding. The lease was between Wayne County Development Alliance and WCC, but commissioners were asked to sign off on the change, from a short-term to long-term lease. County Manager George Wood said at the time that they were eligible for $5.8 million of the bond, with an estimated $1.6 million earmarked for the center.
During what began as a building committee report Tuesday evening, Don Magoon, chief of administrative services, said that State Construction had requested a fee proposal from the designer in accordance with Senate Bill 668.
"An estimated timeline for the project following this approach would not have (the) welding (program) in the building until January 2018," Magoon said.
Board member Wayne Aycock, a commissioner, raised concerns.
"This is moving a lot slower than the commissioners anticipated," he said.
Magoon said he understood, but that working with the state, they "don't have a choice."
"I had a million and a half dollars of bond money set aside to replace the heating loop and they won't let me use bond money to do it," he said. "So that money I've kind of stuck in my back pocket and it'll cover this."
"One of our concerns is, we spent a lot of money on that building," Aycock said. "Could we have built a new one for less money that what it's going to cost us to get in there?"
Magoon said he believed the college would have less than $5 million in the project.
"We've still got pennies on the dollar," he said.
Board member Donnie Barnes was not so sure.
"(The building is) 70,000 square feet," he said. "By the time you get $5 million into it you no longer have it for pennies on the dollar.
"You're getting to the point where you could build a 70,000 square foot building for no more than $5 million. I don't think you're far behind."
"You might be able to but not under State Construction," Magoon replied.
"OK. That's a valid point," Barnes said.
Magoon told the board that some things that had been taken out earlier may be added back in, for the sake of energy efficiency, like LED lights.
"We submitted in the original request, before the referendum, as one of our projects at WCC, up-front, access control systems, security alarm systems, all of those got taken out," Magoon said. "When the final rules for what we could do with that bond money came they were gone.
"The holdup from the state, there's 200 projects ahead of us. It's strictly volume."
Magoon said he had been told that the state is two months behind on handling projects for recipients of the bond.
"We have requested a call so that we can talk about expediting the design fee alone. We probably won't be able to expedite the construction piece of it but if we can get it under design agreement, we can start working," he said. "We can start the design phase and at least maybe get us in sometime next year."
So far, he added, efforts have been thwarted at every turn.
Several asked how far this delay pushed things back.
"Eight months, easily eight months," Magoon replied. "Right now they have one engineer doing all the design contracting and design agreements.
"I hate to be the bearer of bad news. I've been doing this for a year and a half already. But I still believe we have a good building here."
Board member Keith Gunnet asked why the state did not foresee this and step up to expedite things in anticipation of the bond passing.
"This is important," he said. "I mean, we're two years behind, I think. We will be behind what we originally thought we'd be in that building.
"I don't understand. I mean, it's too late now but they should have foreseen this."
Magoon said he had even tried to reduce the size and scope of the first phase of the Advanced Manufacturing Center project to less than $500,000 so they could move forward on it as an informal project.
"They said no, it's already at State Construction," he said. "You'd be circumventing State Construction.
"Folks, I have tried. I've tried. It's been somewhat of a nightmare."