TBO.com - TBO is Tampa Bay Online

Highlands Today

FEMA Awards County $636,000 Grant

ADVERTISEMENT

By JIM KONKOLY

Highlands Today

Published: March 25, 2009

SEBRING - In a surprise phone call this week, Uncle Sam remembered and made good on a grant pledge made three years ago to Highlands County.

As a result, construction contractors will compete soon for about $850,000 worth of work from the county.

Bill Nichols, county emergency operations director, reported Tuesday that the Federal Emergency Management Agency is allocating $636,000 in federal grants to upgrade the wind resistance of two buildings designated as emergency shelters.

The upgrades will be made on the Bert J. Harris Jr. Agricultural Center and the Highlands County Health Department. Both buildings are used as special needs shelters during hurricanes or other natural disasters.

Combined with a 25 percent local match, the two projects carry an estimated price tag of $850,000.

Because of the economic downturn, particularly severe in the construction trades, Mike Wright, county administrator, instructed the purchasing department to advertise for bids on this project as soon as possible.

"You don't turn down three-for-one federal dollars," Wright said. "We have contingencies for this type of situation," he added, referring to covering the 25 percent local match for the federal grants.

The federal funds weren't classified or released as part of the federal stimulus package, Nichols said, but they will serve that purpose for the local construction industry.

"It's a small dent, but it's a step in the right direction," he said about the building upgrades providing business for contractors.

Both projects will upgrade the wind resistance of the buildings to between 130 to 140 mph, Nichols said. The work includes adding structural support beams and refastening the roofs.

"These projects are to 'harden' the agricultural center and the health department, to retrofit those buildings and make them stronger than the normal building code calls for," he said.

FEMA awarded the grants back in 2006, responding to damage from the three hurricanes that hit Highlands County in 2004. But, Nichols said, FEMA officials held up allocating the funds as they discussed changing the standards for shelter buildings.

As the years passed, with no word from FEMA, county officials assumed that the funding might have been cancelled or suspended.

"This is kind of like 'new' money, even though we thought we had this grant funding back in 2006," Nichols said. "It was a pleasant surprise to us to get that phone call (from FEMA)."

While FEMA officials made no reference to "stimulus," Nichols and Wright said they suspect the federal government's drive to stimulate the troubled economy played a role in the decision to release the grant funding.

Nichols called the upgrades to both shelter buildings a wise move.

"We put in for these projects in 2006, before a stimulus was needed," he said. "It's a good idea to move forward with this, because storms are going to continue to come and we need to prepare for it. The county has the responsibility to provide safe shelter for its citizens."

A low bid of about $850,000 was submitted three years ago when the county anticipated getting the FEMA grants. Contractors will compete for the work again through the bidding process, because so much has changed since 2006, Nichols said.

"In 2006 we were at the peak of the housing bubble, construction was booming, and we feel like prices were high then," he said. "Prices have come down, there is a lot more competition, and we think we can get a better price now and give taxpayers a better deal.

"Even though most of this is with federal funds," he added, "the local match does come out of our local county funds."

Jed Secory, county purchasing director, said he hopes to advertise for the shelter retrofits project in this Sunday's newspapers.

"If we can't make that, then it'll be in the following Sunday," he said.

Highlands Today reporter Jim Konkoly can be reached at 863-386-5855 or jkonkoly@highlandstoday.com

Share this:

Loading Comments...

Email Print

ADVERTISEMENT