And ever so often, there’s some good news...

By Meg Olson

Blaine City Council voted unanimously to accept a pleasant surprise. At their August 26 meeting assistant public works director Steve Banham presented bids opened the previous week for construction of the city’s new fire station on Odell Road.

Five of the six bids opened were under the engineer’s estimate and the low bid council chose to accept was $100,000 less than the project was expected to cost.

“We’re feeling pretty good about this,” Banham said. The cost saving to the city will allow for three optional items in construction of the 9,750 square-foot one-story wood framed building: a metal roof, a flagpole and a projection screen for the training room.

The total bid amount to Impero Construction of Bellingham is $1,144,508, and an additional $90,416 in state sales tax will be added to the bill.
Banham said the company had a good local reputation for projects of a similar magnitude. Some of the funds left over from the $1.6 million voter approved bond issued to pay for the project will be used to furnish the fire station. “Any left-over funds go directly to debt service,” said city finance director Meredith Riley.

In other council business Banham reported that attendance at community meetings continued to be light but he hoped informational flyers on the proposed street maintenance levy would draw more people to the final meeting at the community center August 29 at 7 p.m. The proposal for an additional 50 cents in property tax for every $100,000 in assessed valuation will be before voters on the September primary ballot. The funds would be used to boost the city’s street maintenance budget.

City council manager Gary Tomsic said he had heard concerns that the additional $240,000 from the levy would be used to take all the street maintenance burden, giving council an extra $200,000 to play with in the general fund. To allay those fears council passed a motion committing the city to maintain its current level of street maintenance funding through the general fund..

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