PORT TOWNSEND — A request for bids to renovate the derelict Building 202 on the Fort Worden complex into a branch of Peninsula College will be posted next week.
“It’s really happening, and we are excited about this,” said Deborah Frazier, the college’s director of finance and administration, on Thursday.
The call for bids will be published in area newspapers and in the Daily Journal of Commerce on Wednesday.
The construction project is estimated at nearly $4.3 million.
The bids are due by 3 p.m. March 26 at the state Department of Enterprise Services Facilities Division at 1500 Jefferson St. in Olympia and will be opened at about 3:05 p.m.
Once the college awards the bid, the contractor will prepare a work plan that will be due by April 20, Frazier said.
Construction most likely will begin on the project in May or June, she said.
Construction would take about a year.
Fall semester 2016
Classes are projected to begin in the fall of 2016.
Frazier said she did not expect any specific obstacles aside from those that occur when renovating a historical building.
Building 202 was used as barracks at Fort Worden in the 19th century.
“There is a lot that we can’t actually see until we start the demolition and see what’s in the interior,” Frazier said.
Proposed renovation
According to a Peninsula College document, the proposed renovation would create four general classrooms, a science classroom, a studio-art room, a learning lab, a workforce training room, a student study space, faculty offices and a reception space.
It would replace the current quarters of the Peninsula College branch.
The old schoolhouse at 298 Battery Way in Fort Worden State Park has long been inadequate, according to Luke Robins, the college’s president.
The new building would feature video-equipped classrooms where classes can be conducted in one location and viewed in another.
Turning 14,000 square feet of space — about 70 percent of Building 202 — into a home for Peninsula College has been planned since 2011, but action had been postponed because of funding availability and a change in the management of part of Fort Worden.
The Fort Worden Lifelong Learning Center Public Development Authority took over management of the campus portions of the 434-acre park for educational purposes in May.
State Parks continues to manage the camping, beach and recreation areas.
Agreement in January
An agreement between the college and the public development authority (PDA) signed in January includes a lease agreement for 50 years at $1 a year.
The city of Port Townsend and the PDA made commitments for a combined $500,000 toward the renovation, which allowed the college to put the project out to bid, said Dave Robison, director of the PDA.
The construction costs are only part of the project’s total cost of $6.7 million, with $6.2 million already raised.
In addition to the city and PDA commitments, this includes $4.4 million in state capital appropriations; $700,000 from a state Department of Commerce energy grant; and $600,000 from Peninsula College.
The funding gap is $500,000. Robison has said he hopes to use up to $900,000 in historical tax credits to finance the project.
Once a contract is awarded, the exact amount in tax credits would be identified, he said.
________
Jefferson County Editor Charlie Bermant can be reached at 360-385-2335 or cbermant@peninsuladailynews.com.
