Architects bring Construction Company in to talk about Annex Project

The Daviess County Courthouse Annex project was the topic at Wednesday morning’s special meeting of the Daviess County Commissioners.  

 Project architect Jonathan Lamar of Lamar Architecture and Design introduced Ross Reinhardt and Jeremy Koontz of Garmong Construction services, who discussed the various methods for managing construction projects. Koontz said the General Assembly recently approved the use of the Construction Manager at “Risk”  model for public projects.  Under this format the Construction Manager would be on site during construction and would be at risk for over-runs.  The Construction Manager would also be responsible for bidding out the various construction contracts to qualified contractors. 

One advantage of this model is that smaller qualified contractors who might find the required bonding process too expensive could now be included under the bonding umbrella of the Construction Manager.   Koontz said the normal fee for this service is generally 4-5% of the construction contract but the percentage is negotiable.   Commissioner Michael Taylor said that it was important to use as many local contractors as practical in the project.    

The Commissioners will consider the information they received before taking official action.  The time-line for the Annex project is to begin construction at the end of March, 2018.