Kukuvka: "construction market looks failry flat"

MONTICELLO – Sullivan County’s new jail could cost almost $74 million, according to the latest estimate, termed “soft”, by an architect working on the project, and the county sheriff.  That was clearly not what Sullivan lawmakers wanted to hear

Mark Kukuvka, of LaBella Associates in Rochester, gave county legislators their first clear look at what the new jail, to go up off Route 174, near Quickway Exit 104, will look like, and what he expects it might cost, given the current climate in the construction industry.

“The inflation in the construction market looks fairly flat, as it goes into 2009, where in ’07 and ’08, we didn’t know where the bottom was.  In ’07 and ’08, projects were going over budget left and right, because the marketplace was so volatile with steel going to China, and glass, and concrete, cement, things like that.  What I’m hearing from BBL it looks fairly flat in 2009.”

Kukuvka emphasizes the ‘soft’ aspect of the estimate. 

What that $73.8 million estimate would buy for the county is a 256-bed jail that could hold up to 304 inmates, if the county used a permitted option to double-bed 25 percent of the cells.  Additional ‘pods’, each with a capacity of about 50 inmates, could be added, for an estimated $5.2 million each.  Pods could be added in the future if more capacity is needed.

Tentative aerial view of jail

Jail site is on elevated land to the left of Exit 104

While the first estimate on a jail, a year ago, was well over $100 million, and the project has been downsized while still compliant with state mandates, the new figure is not sitting well with county officials.

“Shocked” was the reaction of Republican legislator David Sager, who said he was “dismayed” that the cost didn’t go down a bit more.

“None of us are happy with that”, claimed County Treasurer Ira Cohen, who said he had serious concerns about “affordability and future debt management."

That led Sheriff Michael Schiff to contemplate a worst-case scenario. “Now if we build a brand new jail and we’ve got that big expense to pay for it, and right off the bat, we’re too small and we’re also paying to farm out inmates, transportation costs, and for housing and medical costs, I don’t think that’s sellable to the public.”

Schiff said the design, with 256 beds, would satisfy current needs, for a county without casinos.  He also agreed that the numbers are “very soft”, and the bids could come in anywhere, close to, or not so close, to the $74 million.

Kukuvka said they are looking at every way possible to trim costs further, even going so far as subdividing pods to accommodate different classes of inmates in a single pod.

The tentative timeline is to be able to go to bid, perhaps by November of this year, break ground in early 2010, and open the jail in 2012.  

Right now, the county is negotiating to purchas the planned site.