County architect recommends awarding health department contract with underground sanitary work; board to review intent to award

Boone County officials reviewed bids for a planned addition and renovation to the Health Department and voted to forward the architect’s recommendation — the apparent low base bid plus an underground sanitary sewer alternate — to the full county board as a notice of intent to award.

The architect, Chris Hansen of Kluber, told the committee that six qualified bids were received and that Scandroli Construction of Rockford, Illinois, submitted the low apparent base bid of $4,184,481. He said the architect’s recommendation was to accept the base bid and Alternate 1, the underground sanitary sewer, because that work would be difficult and expensive to add later. Hansen warned that the bid results left a budget gap driven largely by higher-than-expected electrical and low-voltage subcontract costs.

The recommendation matters because the county’s earlier construction estimate was lower and the low bids exceeded that estimate, creating a gap the project team said could be narrowed through targeted value engineering and contractor collaboration. Hansen said contractors had bid the same scope and that the three lowest bidders were within about a 3% spread, which he read as a sign of consistent bidding on the project.

Scandroli representative Kevin Bailey told the committee his company was “very eager to work with the county on this project and try to get the budget more aligned with the cost estimate.”

The committee discussed six bid alternates: Alternate 1 (underground sanitary sewer for a future restroom), Alternates 2–5 (various interior and finish options that can be deferred), Alternate 3 (automatic door operators at the east addition entrance), and Alternate 6 (a deductive alternate removing the planned community room). Hansen said Alternates 2–5 could be added later but that Alternate 1 should be included if the county wants the option to add plumbing for restrooms without reworking the addition.

Committee member Marion Thornberry moved to follow the architect’s recommendation to include Alternate 1; the motion was seconded by Matt Ragano. Committee member Alisa Patterson proposed and the committee approved an amendment to also include Alternate 3 (automatic door operators) because of planned parking and veteran access. After discussion about contingency, timing and the county’s 45-day decision window for alternates, the committee approved sending the recommendation to the full board as a notice of intent to award.

The architect said award would likely be followed by a period of collaboration with Scandroli to identify cost savings (for example, alternate fixture manufacturers) and that the owner’s representative would allow 45 days after contract execution to decide on additional alternates.

If the full board concurs on the notice of intent to award, county staff said they will continue to pursue value-engineering options with the apparent low bidder and the owner’s representative to try to bring costs closer to prior estimates.