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YSU to readvertise for bids on Pollock House project
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Youngstown State University will rework bid specifications and advertise for bids again, after the first bids for the Porter and Mary Pollock House restoration project were over-budget.
By Denise Dick
YOUNGSTOWN
Plans to restore the historic Porter and Mary Pollock House on Wick Avenue will be scaled back after bids for the project came in way overbudget.
The total project cost for restoring the Youngstown State University-owned mansion is about $4.4 million with $2.1 million the estimated base.
Three general contractors submitted bids for the project, and the lowest base bid was $2.6 million.
“We’re going to do some reworking,” said Richard White, associate director of planning and construction at YSU.
The original concept for the project was historical restoration, said Gene Grilli, vice president for finance and administration, at a YSU trustees committee meeting. Now the project will be more of an adaptive reuse, he said.
For the windows, for example, rather than restoring them, the new project will involve new windows that resemble the original ones, Grilli said.
Another change is that the university won’t pursue LEED, Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, certification for the project. It’s a U.S. Green Council certification.
Upon completion, it will be the home of YSU President Cynthia Anderson and future university presidents.
The readvertising for bids will push the project’s timeline back.
“Our plans are to have bids in June with construction to start in July,” White said.
He anticipates completion in early 2012. Initially, the completion was projected in July.
The house was built in 1893 by Charles H. Owsley. It was owned by businessman Paul Wick, who gave it to his daughter, Mary, and her husband, Porter Pollock, who lived in the house until their deaths.
Family members donated it to the university in 1950.
Over the years, it served as classroom and office space, and, in the 1980s, a private developer built a 64-room addition on the mansion and opened it as a full-service hotel under the name Wick-Pollock Inn.
The hotel closed in 1998, and the building has been vacant since, but over the last couple of years, the trustees have been looking at various plans to restore it.
The board considered several options for the building, ultimately deciding to restore it to its original use as a residence and to alter the policy of providing a housing allowance for the president.
The house’s first floor will be used for social gatherings. The second floor will be the president’s residence, and the third floor will be guest quarters.