With bids for new Jeannette fire station at $4M, city looks to scale back plans
After construction bids came in higher than expected for Jeannette’s new fire station, officials are adjusting the scope while time is running out to spend grant money designated for the project.
Four bids were opened Wednesday, but only two offered a price for the entire project. The lowest bid to complete the whole project was $4.17 million.
“It’s not something that we can economically, feasibly do at this point with the project that we have,” said City Manager Ethan Keedy.
He plans to meet with an engineer to redesign the project to fit the city’s budget and seek bids again.
The new station is planned for an empty lot next to the current building, which is attached to city hall on South Second Street.
A $1.2 million grant has to be used by Dec. 31.
Plans for the new station have been in the works since 2019, but prices for supplies and construction materials have increased since then and officials learned the grant would cover only part of the project.
Officials have since separated the work into phases and sought other funding sources. Keedy said Thursday that the federal American Rescue Plan grant, awarded in April 2022, requires that contract activity be completed by Dec. 31 or the money has to be paid back.
In those two years, officials have gotten multiple designs for the station, core sample drillings, permits and bids, he said. A dilapidated home on the city-owned property was demolished.
“It has not been an easy process,” Keedy said. “We’ve done everything we possibly can to make sure this project gets completed.”
He promised those in attendance at Thursday’s council meeting that the new station will be built.
“There’s no hidden agendas, there’s no ‘we’re doing it on purpose’ to make a fire station not happen,” he said. “It’s just the timeline, and the project takes time. We’re adhering to the state laws and the guidelines that they gave us.”
The current station, built in 1927 attached to city hall across Clay Avenue from the new spot, has sewage problems, black mold, termites and asbestos. It also is not big enough to hold all of the department’s trucks.
Jeannette has the only paid full-time firefighters in the county.
Renatta Signorini is a TribLive reporter covering breaking news, crime, courts and Jeannette. She has been working at the Trib since 2005. She can be reached at rsignorini@triblive.com.
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