Animal Shelter Goes to Bid
The Animal Shelter project is officially out to bid. This has been a long time coming and many people are waiting with baited breath for this project to get started.
But first.... Bidding.
The county officially filed the bid documents on October 11th. The bid deadline is December 10th at 2pm. Bids will be opened at 2:15 on December 10th and available to review.
The bids are tentatively scheduled to appear before the BOCC on January 6th.
Some history.
In April 2022, the county hired TOCOI Engineering LLC to provide engineering and consulting services for the new animal shelter design. This is RFQ 21-119 for those that wish to dive into it.
The then budget was $9 million. The design fee was 986,737.35. Just over $6.5 million would be remaining for the actual construction.
This company would be tasked with creating the designs and engineering from 30% design to final design approval... as well as work through bidding and closeout.
So total cost for TOCOI is $986,737.35
On June 10th 2025, the BOCC approved the assignment of the contract to Baxter and Woodman, who apparently purchased TOCOI Engineering.
As with everything, costs go up over time. In 2022, the projected cost was $9 million. Let's see how that has changed.
But first, here is a timeline staff provided the BOCC in January 2025. This gives you an overview from the hiring of the consultant to the most recent discussion in January 2025.
At the January 2025 meeting, staff presented the BOCC with the 100% plans and estimated price tag.
As you can see... in April 2023, the BOCC approved $12,572,509 for the new shelter. With the add on options, it is estimated come in just under $16 million
Now remember, these are engineering estimates, not actual bid proposals.
Without going through all the meetings and what not... let's just say the design has been pretty contentious.
The board has decided to go with a basic design. When presented with a few different options, they chose the cheapest option available to them. For instance, the main dog holding kennels will NOT have air conditioning. They will be "temperature" controlled with ventilation, open air, etc, but no HVAC. This will reduce the costs significantly and that has been the main goal of the BOCC with this project.
Costs ranged from around $12 million to upwards of $25 million. The BOCC wants to go the cheapest possible route on this. The way that it is designed allows for future additions as funding for those things becomes available or should a future board want to add on.
Some of these costs can be paid for by the donations received by the county. As of January 2025, the county had $3,201,975 in donated funds available to apply towards various aspects of the project.
There was another donation of $270,000 from the Schiraldi Trust on May 27, 2025. So the overall total available to go towards the shelter is $3,471,975. There is also $50,000 pending from Dr Massullo. I am told this will be donated if there is an education/classroom/program element to the shelter.
How are we paying for it?
If you remember, Betz farm was sold to help fund the shelter. James Dicks has a contract to purchase the property for $6 million. However, in April 2024, the BOCC signed an amendment to the contract that allows him to hold off on closing on the property until ALL of the approvals he seeks for the property are approved. He currently has plans pending with the county on a development project, but they have been stalled for the time being.
18 months later, still no closing and no $6 million for the shelter.
So the board pivoted from that idea and decided to bond the shelter and borrow the money. During that discussion, commissioners seemed ok with bonding up to $15 million for this... anything over that, the support starts to disappear.
Just a guess, but I see commissioners Bays and Davis supporting this almost regardless of price. Now they wont write a blank check, but they want this done and if prices come back near the estimates, they will support it.
I think commissioner Kinnard will be on board if the cost is not over $15m. Anything over that, I think he will struggle to support it.
Commissioner Barek seems to be out on this completely.
Commissioner Finegan can go either way. She was concerned that the new shelter did not include an additional storage areas, which are problems with the current shelter, among other things. Some of those concerns would be addressed in the alternate add on options. But cost is a concern with her as well.
The big question is... What will this cost?
Answer... No clue.
The estimates are between $12m and $15m or so. The way the bid is set up is the bidders will put a price on the base construction for the base build.
They then have 4 alternates that they will also put a price on.
The board can then decide if they only want the base option or if they would like to add on any of the alternates.
We will see in less than 60 days on what the future of the animal shelter looks like when the costs are revealed.