City awards two big construction contracts

• Public Works building

The 30,000-square-foot public works building, built in 1990 on Benson Street, needs its roof replaced. Debbie Griffin photo

Talk about it

The City Council decided at its Feb. 28 meeting what contractors “won” the city’s construction business for rebuilding Cascade Avenue and for replacing the Public Works building roof.

Haas Sons, Inc. of Thorpe will rebuild Cascade Avenue for a contracted amount of $4,000,985.

The City Council’s documents give estimates of how much each entity involved will be paying for the project. Amounts are based on bid prices.

• $1.8 million…UWRF

• $1.5 million…City of River Falls

• $2.6 million…Wisconsin Department of Transportation via an agreement for the state highway in town.

The overall project cost adds up to about $5.9 million because of several related expenses: A contingency fund of $250,000; about $500,000 for a steam tunnel; various soft costs; resurfacing Fifth Street; making lane transitions at South Main Street; and replacement of sewer and water mains at Fourth Street.

A memorandum from City Engineer Reid Wronski says the city has not awarded a contract to Haas in the recent past, but UW-River Falls has used the firm as general contractor and was “very satisfied with their performance.”

The city also contacted Haas’ references, all of which provided good feedback.

The memo says Haas was the prime contractor for the $8.9 million reconstruction of Hastings Way in Eau Claire.

Haas submitted the lowest bid, with the second-, third- and fourth-lowest coming in at $4.3, $5.8 million and $6.2.

The big River Falls reconstruction project starts in April. Plans call for Cascade -- from Spruce Street through Oak Knoll Avenue -- to be closed through the summer and slated to reopen by Nov. 1.

The city received 11 bids for work to replace the roof on the city garage, also known as the public works building, 950 Benson St.

The council agreed with the roofing-consultant’s recommendation and awarded that contract to low bidder Quality Roofing of Marshfield, which submitted a bid of $202,700.

The highest of the 11 bids received was $277,318.

A memorandum from the city’s building maintenance supervisor, Tom Schwalen, says the project should start around April 2 and finish by about the end of June.

River Falls listed the roof-replacement project in the 2012 capital improvement plan with an estimated cost of $300,000.

Schwalen’s memo says the city hired a specialized roof inspector to conduct an assessment, which showed the roof membrane and membrane flashing to be in “very poor” condition. The inspector recommended replacement.

The “city garage” is a 21-year-old building with 30,000 square feet.

The original ballasted rubber roof began to show shrinkage in 1998. Repairs and maintenance have been done since to keep a watertight seal.

The new roof, says the memo, will have a 20-year manufacturer’s warranty and a three-year contractor’s warranty.

The roof project will include replacement of several flashings, as well as a roof-access ladder.

The new roof will be a “ballasted EPDM roof system,” which is ethylene propylene diene terpolymer, a rubber roofing membrane.

At its Feb. 14 meeting, the City Council said yes to city staff seeking to refinance seven loans totaling $4.5 million.

At its meeting Feb. 28, the city learned that interest rates had been even lower than River Falls anticipated when it proposed refinancing.

Expecting to yield a deal that would save about $338,000 over 16 years, the city reported the actual savings would be closer to $510,000 over that time period.

Tags: river falls, government, wisconsin, business