One bid under budget for Fillmore project

FILLMORE -- News just kept getting better the more envelopes that were opened at Thursday's special meeting of the Fillmore Town Council.

With a $590,000 construction budget (of a total grant of $724,353), for the storm sewer and repaving project along Main Street, town officials were hoping for an estimate that fell within the spectrum.

On the last of four bids opened, they got it.

Eagle Valley Inc. of Indianapolis submitted the low bid of $548,633 for the entire project.

The other three bids submitted were Hunt Paving Co. for $801,271.51, Steve Cooper Excavating at $779,451.90 and Rieth Riley for $627,589.50.

While Eagle Valley's bid is clearly the lowest, Lorie Young of Robert E. Curry and Associates, the engineering firm overseeing the project for the town, requested time to make a certified bid tabulation and to review the bids with Town Attorney Mary Russell.

The Fillmore Town Council will conduct a special meeting at 5:30 p.m. on Wednesday, July 10 to officially accept one of the bids. This will be followed by a pre-construction meeting at 1 p.m. on Friday, July 12.

Kristy Jerrell of West Central Economic Development said the process should move pretty fast once a bid is accepted. With the acceptance of the bid will come a fair amount of state paperwork due to it being funded by a grant from the Indiana Office of Community and Rural Affairs (OCRA).

However, Jerrell said once the paperwork is submitted to OCRA, she would expect the money released within a week and a half, meaning construction is likely to begin before the end of July.

This was good news to councilors Tami Van Rensselaer and Alan Jones, who hope work in front of the Fillmore Elementary School can be complete or close to complete when school resumes.

The project will install storm sewers along Main Street from Cemetery Road on the north to just south of the school. The street will be repaved over the length of the project.

The estimates were actually submitted in two pieces, a base bid for the sewer work and an alternate bid for the asphalt overlay.

Each bid broke down as follows:

* Eagle Valley.: $468,686 base, $79,947 alternate: $548,633 total.

* Hunt Paving: $698,578.09 base, $102,693.42 alternate: $801,271.51 total.

* Steve Cooper Excavating: $628,792 base, $150,659.90 alternate: $779,451.90 total.

* Rieth Riley: $569,877 base, $57,712.40 alternate: $627,589.40 total.