Daniel Prince
Low bid came in nearly $1.5 million more than funding set aside for project
Union County Council’s Committee on Administration and Finance met Tuesday afternoon to discuss funding for the proposed expansion of the Union County Detention Center. Last summer, it appeared the funding was worked out, as council allocated the rest of the American Rescue Plan Act funds as well as some money from other funds within the county to pay for the estimated $7.1 million expansion. The problem is that the lowest bid came back at $8.6 million, leaving $1.5 million that the county has to find, or else change or abandon the project. Supervisor Phillip Russell said he does not want to raise taxes or raid the county’s fund balance to pay for the expansion. The county’s debt limit is around $1.4 million, but Russell said issuing a bond should not be an option, as that borrowing capacity may be needed down the road. Committee chairman Dr. John Flood asked if a lease-purchase could be used, as the Monarch Fire District had done something similar with a building one time. He said a lease-purchase from 2018 is coming off the books this spring, so no additional money would be added to the taxes if the county were able to go the lease-purchase route. The supervisor said he would have to investigate that and see if the regulations allow that as an option. Russell said in talks with the architects, engineers, and contractors, he was able to make some cuts to get the overall price to $8.34 million.
He said one of the major problems that has led to overcrowding at the jail is the courts, which he called a broken process:
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If the delegation can’t provide the money, one other potential source that could be tapped to help cover the shortfall is a $500,000 grant the county recently received. Russell said he had planned to use that to convert part of the Chrysler building for historical document storage and another part of the building into an animal shelter; however, he said if that money has to be used for the jail, he would be okay with that. The council committee did not make any recommendations at the meeting, but the matter will be brought before the full council next week for further discussion and possible action. The low bidder has to know by the end of the month whether the project will proceed or not. Russell said if the money from the state falls through and there are no other ways to pay for it, he would recommend taking the American Rescue Plan Act funds that were to be used for the expansion and use them instead to remodel the existing facility. Dr. Flood asked council members to be thinking of options if the state money doesn’t come through, and to decide what their threshold would be to move forward with the project or not.