Oklahoma County officials review $2.9M KONE proposal after jail elevators repeatedly fail

Oklahoma County officials on a special infrastructure board meeting discussed a KONE proposal to modernize up to three elevators at the County Detention Center, with the vendor bid listed at about $2.9 million and installation proposed to begin in 2027.

Donald Brassy, maintenance director with the county jail, told the board the elevators are 37 years old — past the typical 25–30 year lifespan — and described frequent failures that have affected operations. "Seven of those times we did have trapped personnel," Brassy said, adding that the facility logged 57 downtime events in the past fiscal year and that one elevator was recently red-tagged and shut down by an inspector.

Brassy said the county asked KONE to resubmit a proposal after earlier bids expired; the most recent modernization price submitted June 1 was about $2,910,000, which staff presented to the board as "mapped not to exceed $2,900,000." He told members the proposal estimates about 18 weeks of downtime per elevator plus two weeks of testing.

Board discussion highlighted two issues: immediate reliability and total project costs. A member challenged Brassy's figure, noting KONE's service log showed only eight KONE callouts in six months and asking why the county counted 57 events. Brassy replied the larger count includes times county maintenance had to reset or repair the elevators without KONE on site; "That's not how many times KONE has been called," he said, describing internal resets and maintenance activity that left the elevators out of service.

County staff and technical advisors urged short-term steps to protect safety while the board evaluates long-term options. "Spend the money, put KONE on-site if they're willing to do so, begin there," said Keith, a county staff member, recommending contracted on-site service during peak times to reduce downtime. He noted the county's prior experience buying on-site service for courthouse elevators and said KONE's published rate was about $355 per service hour (higher for overtime), so the measure carries recurring cost.

Staff also warned that the vendor price likely understates total cost. Keith and other staff members listed likely additional expenses: architect and engineering design, electrical feed upgrades, machine-room modifications, HVAC, fire-suppression work and third-party oversight to document code compliance. Based on recent projects, staff suggested adding roughly $1 million as contingency on top of the vendor figure to cover those site and code-related costs.

Board members discussed whether to phase the work or proceed with all three elevators. Staff cautioned that many code and machine-room tasks are fixed costs and that scaling back would not eliminate those expenses. Instead the board directed short-term actions: order critical parts now, pursue KONE technician coverage at the jail during busy periods, and solicit an RFP for an architect and engineer so the board can get design estimates and firm cost projections before committing to full replacement. Staff were asked to take the temporary-service funding request to the next BET meeting for possible reimbursement.

The board did not approve a contract for full modernization at this meeting. Members received the KONE proposal and the maintenance document and voted to receive the presentation and materials for consideration. The meeting ended without a decision to award a modernization contract; next steps are procurement of parts, review of architect estimates and further board consideration.

Votes at a glance: The board approved routine motions on the agenda, including receiving the materials on the elevator proposal and adjourning the meeting. Individual roll-call tallies were not recorded in the transcript; verbal "ayes" were recorded for procedural motions.