The Cass County Board of Supervisors, today (Wednesday), approved the awarding of a contract to Tbb&m, LLC in Greenfield, for reconstruction of the lower floor of the building at 707 Poplar Street. That portion of the building will be used as a new 9-1-1/Communications Center.

The Board held-off on awarding the contract during their meeting last week, because there was an insufficient breakdown of the costs. Cass County 9-1-1 Director Rob Koppert presented a revised listing of the costs through the project’s architects, but it still wasn’t to the Supervisors’ satisfaction. Supervisor Chuck Rieken said he understands why the contractor wouldn’t want to provide too much in the line of specifics. he said the general contractor wouldn’t want to do that unless their bid was accepted. Koppert agreed.

What swayed the board to accept the $365,000 bid, was a reduction in the amount the County will have to pay. Koppert said he had “$75,353 worth of good news” where the cost was concerned. He said the County can pay the entire cost of the HVAC installation with 9-1-1 Surcharge money, instead of property tax dollars, which saves the County $41,800. And, since the generator is required by State law, the County can pro-rate what the usage would be, since the machine would power the entire building, and not just the Comm. Center in the event of primary power failure. A pro-rated amount of $33,563 can be paid for the 9-1-1 Surcharge dollars.

That leaves the County to pay $11,187 on the generator portion, for a total bill to the County amounting to $280,647. $75,353 would be paid through 9-1-1 surcharges.