Contract awarded for work at Oakhill

Photo

Oakhill Renaissance Place

The winning bid was about half the architect’s estimate.

Staff report

YOUNGSTOWN — The Mahoning County Building Commission has awarded a $631,275 contract for renovations at Oakhill Renaissance Place to Murphy Contracting Co. of Youngstown.

The contract awarded Tuesday covers renovation of two office areas for the county’s Department of Job and Family Services; the third-floor west wing to be occupied by the county recycling division; fourth-floor public restrooms and the hot-water-distribution system in the building’s south tower.

JFS has been in the county-owned Oakhill building since July 2007, occupying temporary quarters in the building as other areas undergo renovation. The recycling division will move to Oakhill this fall from the county’s South Side Annex on Market Street.

Murphy’s successful bid was about half the architect’s $1.1 million to $1.2 million estimate for the job, noted Tracie A. Kaglic, Oakhill project manager at Olsavsky-Jaminet Architects Inc. Kaglic attributed the low bid to the depressed state of the economy.

“Estimates do not mean very much right now,” added architect Ray Jaminet.

The commission also voted to apply for federal money to pay for heating-system upgrades at Oakhill, which is the former Forum Health Southside Medical Center.

“We should be applying for stimulus dollars for everything related to that building to help us offset the costs,” said county Commissioner John A. McNally IV.

For the past several months, the commission has been studying whether to install a new $2.9 million heating system featuring multiple small, natural-gas-fired boilers throughout the building, remain with steam heat from Youngstown Thermal or operate with a combination of both systems.