Mar 14, 2013 3 min read

JEFFERSON – Southwestern Pennsylvania Water Authority awarded contracts totaling more than $13 million Thursday for the first phase of the expansion of the authority’s water treatment plant.

Bids for the work, which will increase the plant’s capacity from 7 million to 9.2 million gallons a day, came in under budget, authority engineer Randy Krause said.

The contracts were awarded subject to approval by the Pennsylvania Infrastructure Investment Authority, which provided the authority with a low-interest loan for the project.

The authority is scheduled to close on the $8.6 million PENNVEST loan May 21. If that is completed, as scheduled, notices to proceed can be issue to the contractors the following day, Krause said. He noted PENNVEST could reduce the loan amount based on the lower contract costs.

About half of the money for the project will come from PENNVEST; the remainder is being funded by bonds issued by the authority in November.

The project was divided into four contracts. The general contract was awarded to G.M. McCrossin Inc., which submitted a bid of $8,106,352. The contract for electrical work went to Lanco Electric Inc. at $4,550,000; the plumbing contract went to McRandal Co. Inc. at $74,000 and the heat and air conditioning contract went to Port Vue Plumbing Inc. at $387,885.

The contractors were awarded to the low bidders. Only one bid was received for the electrical work. A second bid for that contract was submitted, but was deemed ineligible because it was submitted late and included errors, Krause said.

The second phase of the project, which will increase the plant’s capacity from 9.2 million to 16.1 million gallons a day, will be completed later. Funding will have to be arranged for the second phase, roughly estimated to cost about $7 million.

In other business, Mark Duane of Hayes Design Group provided the board with a comparison between building a new administration building and renovating and expanding the existing administration building.

A plan to build a new building on property on Route 88 near Dry Tavern was halted last month when the board voted down a motion to hire a geo-technical engineer to core drill the site. Several members asked the architect to present the board with a comparison of the two options.

Duane reviewed the advantages of each option. Building the new building was estimated to cost $3 million, while the renovations and expansion were estimated at $1.3 million.

The board made no decision on the matter. Several board members have said they can’t see the authority spending money for a new building until it determines where it stands financially with its plant expansion project.

The board received an audit for the year ending Sept. 30, 2012 that indicated no findings or instances of non-compliance with accounting principles. Auditor Randy Guthrie described the authority’s financial condition as “very solid.”

The board agreed to step up efforts to create a separate authority to develop a park at the authority’s Wisecarver reservoir property.

The park authority is to be formed by the authority, Greene County and Franklin Township to manage the park and raise money for the park’s development. The new authority is to be separate from the water authority and is not to be funded by the authority’s ratepayers or the county’s and township’s taxpayers.

The motion to move ahead with the new authority and spend up to $25,000 on its creation was approved after authority manager Jack Golding reported a state grant awarded for the park would expire soon and the funding agent indicated an extension would be granted only if the new park authority had been formed.