Architects discuss design, other issues relating to Vernon County's new jail

Wednesday, September 19, 2007
Steve Moyer/Daily Mail Vernon County Sheriff Ron Peckman, in the background, displays a drawing of the county's new jail as Presiding Commissioner Bonnie McCord, State Rep. Barney Fisher and Nevada/Vernon County Area Chamber of Commerce director Kathi Wysong examine it, during a public meeting on the progress of the jail, held in the home economics building at the Vernon County fairgrounds on Tuesday.

The Vernon County Commissioners held an informational meeting at the home economics building at the Vernon County fairgrounds Tuesday evening. A sparse crowd was on hand to hear the architect, Larry Goldberg of GS&M Architects and Planners Inc., give an update on the new facility. Goldberg said that thanks to the extensive experience of J.E. Dunn contractors with jail construction, some of the initial work is being fast-tracked.

Officials hoped that fast-tracking some of the work would help make up for time lost when it was discovered that a large sandstone mass underneath the area of the jail meant a basement couldn't be built for the facility.

"Sandstone is hard except when it isn't," Goldberg said. "You can't build on it like you can on bedrock, it will crumble. In a way that's a blessing for us. We can build this steel building that will hold more than the basement would and be able to be utilized for several other uses."

Although the crowd was small they had several questions for Goldberg about the structure of the facility, the staffing and the financing.

"How many people will it take to operate this facility around the clock?" Jerry Janes asked.

"It will take at least two jailers on duty at all times," Goldberg said. "With the way we have this set up, it would take nine to 10 jailers to staff it around the clock. As I said earlier, if this were not as sophisticated a design with direct visual control you're probably looking at substantially more staff, 15 to 17, so it's some real savings."

Chamber director Kathi Wysong asked about cost increases and Goldberg said that estimates for both labor and materials were higher than originally thought but noted that nothing had been bid. Since the estimates were conservative in the first place the bids might come in lower than thought.

"The truth is I can project, and Don has done an exhaustive analysis, they're on their second and we'll soon be going into our third, the truth is you can do 87 and until you bid the thing, you won't know what it is," Goldberg said. "Any of these numbers can come in better than we estimate, we're estimating conservatively."

In answer to a question Goldberg estimated that the financing could be in place in 60 days.

"The push is on to get to closing," Goldberg said. "We could get it done in 50 to 60 days."

Goldberg said that the design had been whittled down to the point where savings would not be easy to achieve.

"If you asked me what we could do away with I would say nothing, I can't take one more square foot out of here," Goldberg said. "It would no longer be compliant with American Correction Association, and you do not want me to build a jail that is not compliant with federal guidelines, it would be criminal on my part."

Wysong asked what the provision for tornadoes would be since the jail wouldn't have a basement.

"I have to design this to withstand eight on the Richter scale," Goldberg said. "For an architect earthquakes and tornadoes are the same thing. The forces involved are the same, in one the ground moves the bottom of the building in the other the wind moves against the top of the building because of wind pressure. Because of all the concrete and rebar inside the walls it is extremely strong to withstand these forces. Short of something like an F5 tornado sitting right down on it, and I don't know anything that would withstand that, it will retain its structural integrity and people can get out safely."

Goldberg said that in addition to the structure itself being very sound the addition of the steel jail cells made it even more so.

"The way the cells are welded together makes them like a large box girder that adds strength to the building," Goldberg said. "We didn't depend on it when designing the building, we thought that it might but we didn't have the numbers to back it up, now we do."

After the question session the people gathered in small groups with Judge James Bickel in one, the commissioners in another and Sheriff Ron Peckman in a third to discuss the presentation and look at the drawings and model of the proposed jail.

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