Menu
Courthouse repair projects coming up
Nevada Daily Mail
"Other than last year's repairs to the chimney, there's not much been done in the way of maintenance to the courthouse in about 20 years," said Northern Commissioner Neal Gerster. "And boy does this place need it."
"That's why last year, when we heard there was a 70/30 matching grant available from the state, we jumped on it and applied," said Presiding Commissioner Joe Hardin.
"It's called a Missouri Heritage Properties Grant," continued Hardin, "and there's a priority for buildings listed on the National Register of Historic Places, of which this courthouse is one."
The grant comes from a revolving fund administered by the State Historic Preservation Office, which is part of the Missouri Department of Natural Resources.
"Last year, SHPO gave us what they call an architectural survey grant," said Southern Commissioner Everett Wolfe. "It was $25,000 and we used it to determine what needs to be repaired and how much it will cost."
"Because we had a good hunch about what the problems were," said Hardin "we asked the firm doing the survey to spread it over several years. These things don't come cheap!"
The Springfield based firm, n|Form Architecture, gave the commission a three-phased plan for repairs. Phase one addresses repair of stone entrances and foundation wall on two sides. Phase two calls for the replacement of 113 windows and phase three would repair water damaged plaster.
"We applied for and received a follow-on grant of $120,000," said Hardin, "to cover the cost of phase one repairs. The county kicks in $36,000, the state $84,000 and now we have to send out a request for qualifications."
While an architectural firm was used in last year's grant, each new state grant requires the county commission to solicit new bids by architectural firms who seek to prepare the specifications for work to be completed. These plans must be submitted and approved by the state before bids from contractors can be solicited.
"We have to send out the request for qualifications by June 1, and select a firm by the 27th," added Hardin. "While it takes a bit of time to jump through the hoops, we expect to get phase one completed this year."
The phase one grant would address foundation problems caused by improper water drainage on the south and east sides and make repairs to the building's four stone entrances.
Foundation wall repairs to the south and east sides will excavate down to the footing, repoint the open joints, apply a waterproof membrane and protection board, install perforated pipe and backfill and grade the areas.
Repairs to the four stone entrances will clean stone, repoint joints, patch spalled stone, inject cracks with fill, caulk around door frames, paint wooden arches, calk joints at steps and landing, patch cracks at steps and replace entryway roofing.
Spalling refers to the flaking of stones due to weathering.
Phase two repairs would replace all existing windows and aluminum entrances with ones that replicate the original style and would replace blocking and trim as necessary.
"Since the grant is from the state historic preservation office, they require that restoration work brings the building back to its original look" said Gerster. "It would be good to stabilize the courthouse and bring it back to its original appearance."
"The problem is cost," said Hardin. "Even if we could get the grant to replace all the windows, our share of $565,000 would be $169,500. Now if we could spread that out over say, four years, that we could handle. But we don't know if they'll award us any more grants beyond the first two."
The phase three plaster work was estimated to be $100,000.
"But for now," added Hardin, "the stone work is most critical and that we're working to complete this year."