by Clinton Bowman
Yoakum County Correspondent
info@www.towntalkradio.com
The Commissioner’s Court met on Monday, May 2, where they addressed their weekly agenda.
Taking up a majority of the time was a discussion with Level 5 Design group representative Justin Gilmore concerning the redesign of the new Denver City Community Center. In the April 18 meeting the Court rejected all bids that had been submitted for the new Community Building.
At that meeting two bids had been submitted; one from Butler Construction of Midland who had submitted a bid of $4.3 million and the second one from Level 5 Design who had submitted a bid of $3.2 million for the 12,500 square foot structure. Both bids were at least $1 million over the projected cost of the building.
At that meeting both bidders were in attendance and offered suggestions on how the cost could be cut with several adjustment.
Gilmore presented each commissioner with the new plans that showed several cost savings including downsizing the entire facility by just over 2,100 square feet. Most of the square footage cut back would be in the corridor and the banquet hall. The original banquet hall was going to seat 500 people and after the redesign that number was cut back to 350.
“Just changing brands on several of the electrical devices saved a tremendous amount,” Gilmore said. “And we also changed the cabinets and back splash to stainless steel and that too was a big savings.”
Gilmore emphasized the fact the changing of the brands in no way affected the quality of the sound system. He went on to say with rebidding each item, the time frame to just get started would probably be another two to three months.
And in wrapping it up Gilmore said new bids should be no higher than $2.4 million top end.
Earlier in the year Oxy had committed $1 million towards the project and with that commitment had asked for a nice ultramodern sound and video system for the safety meetings that are held in the facility.
Moving on to other items in the Commissioners last meeting it was decided that a request from Excel Energy for permission to survey Section 505 in Precinct #1 was privately owned and they couldn’t act on the request, but after looking closer it was decided a small portion of the land was actually county land. That being decided the Commissioners unanimously approved the request to survey Section 505, Block D, Survey J. H. Gibson, Yoakum County, Texas.
Commissioners could still not act on an agreement between Werfen USA, LLC Instrumentation Laboratory Capital Purchase and Agreement with Yoakum County Hospital because the appropriate documents were still not completed.
However the Commissioners did unanimously approve a petition to Centurion Pipeline, L.P. for the right to bore, lay, construct, install, occupy, use, operate, maintain, repair, replace and remove steel pipeline under County Road 330 Yoakum County, Texas.
They also unanimously approved the engagement letter for GASB OPEB valuation for Yoakum County. This is something that is done every other year. The total cost this year was $8,325.
There were no request for the disposal of county equipment, no line item transfers, and no Soil Conservation request.
Commissioner Woody Lindsey reminded Justin Gilmore the sound boards for the Senior Citizen building had still not been installed.
In auditing and settling all accounts against the County the court approved to pay all bills from the General Fund which totaled $23,699.08, Precinct 1 totaled $346.71, Precinct 2 bills totaled $1,208.49, Precinct 3 bills totaled $1,512.00, Precinct 4 bills totaled $385.58, Yoakum County Landfill was $8,513.99 and Library Grants Fund was $181.30 for a grand total of $35,847.15.
In medical bills $91,221.09 was paid from the hospital funds, $9,303.04 to West Texas Medical Center and $390.35 to the Plains Clinic for a grand total of $100,914.48 of hospital bills.
In other medically related bills $678.35 was paid to Home Health and $6,897.78 to Dialysis for a grand total of $108,490.61 in medically related bills.
Commissioners Woody Lindsey, Ray Marion, Ty Earl Powell, and Tim Addison along with County Judge Jim Barron were in attendance.
The next meeting will be held 10 a.m. Monday, May 9 in the County Courthouse.
