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Welty/Ricciuti Chosen to Build 7th District Courthouse
"By Dennis LaRueYOUNGSTOWN, Ohio -- Welty Building Co. Limited, Akron, and Ricciuti Balog & Partners Architects, Youngstown, were awarded the contract Tuesday to build the courthouse for the Ohio 7th District Court of Appeals in the downtown.The board of Youngstown Central Area Community Improvement Corp. determined that Welty/Ricciuti, in addition to submitting the lowest bid Dec. 4, also submitted the best bid at just over $3.4 million. The CIC had set a cap of $3.83 million.With advice from consultant architect Brenda Williams, the CIC staff chose the package of Welty/Ricciuti's base bid of just over $3 million and three of six alternate bids: a complete basement, $248,532, a roof monitor/dome, $95,602 and a marble floor, $17,902. The CIC chose not to add a canopy or to install statuary and planter urns. It also chose marble floors over granite. Afterward, Paul Ricciuti, principal in Ricciuti Balog, said the design is 30% complete and the remaining 70% will be complete in three months, when construction will begin.The two-story building with 13,500 square feet of floor space is to open Jan. 1, 2006.The CIC board also kept Williams as its consultant in building the courthouse, a role she has filled in the construction of the four-story office building, nearing completion, for the Mahoning County Children Services Board and state Bureau of Workers Compensation.While Williams asked for, and received, a contract that would allow her to earn up to $36,120 for her work on the Children Services building, she has been paid $12,582 to date, CIC Executive Director Jason Whitehead reported, and he doesn't anticipate she will submit a bill of more than $2,000 for the remainder of her work.Williams is responsible for ensuring that a general contractor's work is satisfactory, that it uses the materials called for and for helping its work force stay on schedule. She reports periodically on a building's progress to CIC staff and the CIC board.The CIC has not set a cap for Williams' consulting work on the courthouse nor has she submitted a figure. That likely will happen next month.The CIC is satisfied that Welty, as general contractor on the 7th District courthouse, will make good-faith efforts to hire minority- and female-owned subcontractors in its construction.William Carter, who heads Youngstown Area Development Corp. (the city's minority enterprise office), Whitehead, and Third Ward Councilman Richard Atkinson met an hour Monday afternoon with courthouse project manager Mike Melnyk. All subcontracting jobs are open for bid, they said Melnyk assured them. In contrast, Carter said, Jance Construction Co., Kent, general contractor for the Children Services building, had openings for only three subcontractors, painting, flooring and landscaping.Jance had signed agreements with 15 contractors as part of his bid on the Children Services building, Carter said. In contrast, he continued, Welty's Melnyk assured him that Welty has yet to sign an agreement with any subcontractors and is willing to contract with non-union companies provided they are either minority- or female-owned.Few minority contractors use union labor, Carter stated. On the Children Services Building, only one minority contractor performed any work, a landscaper who bid $17,000. That structure will cost $7.3 million when it's completed.Jance said it was willing to employ minority subcontractors, it reminded the CIC executive committee earlier this month, but could not find any local companies except the landscaper despite calling all 18 minority-owned companies on Carter's list. It was unwilling to go outside the area because of the requirement that city residents be given priority in hiring and those in surrounding subdivisions be accorded second preference.Carter had said Jance failed to show "good-faith" efforts because it did not recruit minority subcontractors in Akron and Cleveland.Asked which is more important, hiring city residents or minority contractors outside the immediate areas, Atkinson said hiring city residents. Carter said hiring minority contractors. Both expressed optimism Welty will succeed in hiring city residents who are female and/or minority.In other action, at Youngstown Finance Director David Bozanich's request, the CIC board agreed to determine that the land where the PharMor Center sits should be acquired by the city and that such an acquisition would serve a public purpose (more so than a commercial purpose). The board's action allows the city to issue $850,000 in notes and save $30,000 in interest over their life, Bozanich said."