Killeen hires contractor for church
Posted On: Wednesday, Dec. 16 2009 05:38 AM
By Hailey Persinger
Killeen Daily HeraldThe Killeen City Council took its next step Tuesday in redeveloping the former First Baptist Church building.
In a 5-2 vote with Council members JoAnn Purser and Larry Cole dissenting, the council approved a service contract with Houston-based Jamail & Smith Construction for both the planning and construction phases of redevelopment. The company also has a satellite office in Killeen.
The council bought the 80,000-square foot property in 2006, and following months of debate regarding its use, voted last month to approve the same plan it had voted down months before.
The building is now set to house Richard Milburn Academy, the Head Start program and Bell County offices. Designing the space for renovation is phase one of the project.
City Manager Connie Green said the design phase will cost $396,675 and will include schematics for transforming the two-story education building into the space that will house Milburn Academy and Head Start.
The ground floor of the building is slated to be renovated into office space. Designs for upgrades to the HVAC system, the sanctuary and kitchens is also included, as well as the demolition and removal of one building that will later be the site of a playground area.
The construction phase, he said, will not exceed more than $4.2 million but that "we won't know the final number on that until the design phase is complete."
Though the measure was voted through, Purser and Cole dissented, citing concerns that the project did not go out for bid and worries that too much money was being poured into the building.
Green said the reason for foregoing a bidding process in which multiple companies submit their cost estimates for the same project, depended on the deadline for use of federal funding. Some federal stimulus dollars and community development block grants used for the project could be revoked next September if unused.
For Purser, however, the timeline should have taken a backseat to a bidding process.
"Economic conditions are too hard today to not go out for bid on that project," she said. "It is too important to our local contractors to not go out to bid on that job."
Cole said the city should not be financially responsible for designing the tenants' spaces.
"I don't think we need to put any more money into the First Baptist Church," he said. "Let the tenants design their space and remodel or rehabilitate their space as needed."
The council will break for the holidays and will reconvene for its first meeting of the new year Jan. 12.
Contact Hailey Persinger at
haileyp@kdhnews.com or (254) 501-7568,