Designers outline $300 million plan for new North Dakota State Hospital; $30 million in cuts identified

Design and construction teams told the Senate Appropriations Committee’s Human Resources Division on Feb. 12 that design is moving toward a July 2025 construction start for a new North Dakota State Hospital in Jamestown provided the Legislature funds the project at the expected level.

Pam Segnus, executive director of the Division of Behavioral Health at the North Dakota Department of Health and Human Services, told the committee the meeting’s first presentation was “on the building of the new state hospital, which is a follow‑up from our budget last year where we had $12,500,000 appropriated to design a new state hospital.”

Why it matters: committee members were asked to decide not only whether to fund the project but at what level. The design team presented a $300 million baseline that would deliver a consolidated campus west of the existing facility in Jamestown and described a longer, $330 million package the House considered that would add back several features including a second access road and 24 additional beds. Engineers and construction managers said the $300 million plan was the minimum the current design team could build without a redesign; reducing below that would require a new design phase and would likely delay a summer 2025 start.

Design, site and schedule Mike Van Clai, owner’s representative with Tegra Group, said the state’s original design allocation was $12.5 million and that the team subsequently identified the design budget needed to rise to about $15.5 million (an emergency $3 million transfer was used during the current budget). Van Clai said, “As owners representatives, our responsibility is to make sure that the state of North Dakota is always represented fully in the discussions and design process as it goes along.”

JLG Architects (Mark Hunze), Mortenson Construction (Joanna Salinski) as construction manager…