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County chooses contractor to demolish Jones School
Long debated by county officials, the next step for Jones School became more of a reality on Monday morning.
In a 2-1 bid during a special meeting, the Putnam County Commissioners accepted a $208,948 bid from Denney Excavating to demolish the 69-year-old building.
While the bid from Denney was not the lowest submitted, all three commissioners saw positives in the level of detail to which Denney went in its bid, including breaking out the $42,000 bid to add topsoil, seed and straw as separate from the base bid of $166,948.
County Engineer Jim Peck, in attendance for highway-related matters, noted that the inclusion of a plan for seed and straw is a positive, as the contractor will likely have to work with the city regarding erosion control with Indiana Department of Environmental Management regulations.
With commissioners Tom Helmer and David Berry voting in favor, Rick Woodall dissented on the final vote, wanting more consideration given to the low bid of $163,000 submitted by Collom Excavating of Rosedale.
Ultimately, though, Berry said was unsure of the level of detail and degree of experience on some of the lower bids, while all three agreed that several were too high.
For Berry and Helmer, the final consideration came down to Denney or Pickett Field Service of Crawfordsville with its bid of $205,169.90.
“If you take Denney and Pickett, they’re $3,000 apart,” Berry said. “That tells me they know what they’re looking at.”
“I’m just excited we’re going forward with tearing this building down,” Woodall said.
After serving the elementary students of Greencastle’s West Side from 1954 through 2001, Jones School became the Putnam County Courthouse Annex when Greencastle Community Schools sold it to the county for $1 following the construction of Deer Meadow Primary School.
It continued in its annex role until 2011, when the deteriorating condition of the building forced county officials to move all offices out of the building, with only the gymnasium utilized for storage until recently, when even that ceased due to a leaky roof.
In the last decade or so, officials have alternated between the opinion that the building and land should be sold and that it should be retained for the site of a future annex.
In 2017, the county even agreed in principle to the sale of the building and land to Milestone Ventures to turn the existing building into senior housing. However, Milestone was unable to obtain the Indiana tax credits it had in previous projects such as at the former Miller School, so the sale fell through.
Meanwhile, the building at the corner of Liberty and Madison streets has only become more delapidated, with a roof that now leaks in all parts of the building and windows boarded over several years ago.
At this point, county officials plan to keep the land for a future annex, although two nearby businesses — the Putnam Inn and West Central Veterinary Clinic — have expressed interest in buying portions of the property.
The cost of demolishing the structure will come out of the Putnam County Annex fund, which the commissioners established in recent years from Economic Development Income Tax money.
The commissioners plan to negotiate a timeline with Denney regarding the demolition.
In other business, the Commissioners:
• Agreed to the purchase of a new Caterpillar 320 excavator for the Putnam County Highway Department.
The equipment will be purchased on a five-year lease through First National Bank, whose interest rate of 3.79 percent was lower than those submitted by North Salem State Bank, Tri-County Bank and the manufacturer.
The lease will be paid in five annual payments, with the first due on Feb. 21, 2024.
• Signed the financial commitment agreement on the 2023 Community Crossings grant application.
The county is applying for $1 million to pave 1.73 miles of County Road 1050 South, with the county needing to provide $333,333.34 as part of the 75-25 matching program.
The grant has not been approved by the state.
Highway Director Clint Maddox noted the need.
“It carries a lot of the traffic from Ivanwald subdivision,” Maddox said. “As far as I know, there’s going to be an RV park there. It’s in the works.”
• Approved moving forward with an application to rehabilitate the decks of two bridges on West Walnut Street Road — Bridge 112 over Big Walnut Creek and Bridge 109 over Little Walnut Creek.
Bridge 112 will come at a total cost of $1,554,000, with a local match of $310,800. Bridge 109 will have a total cost of $1,249,250 and a local match of $249,850.
Like the Community Crossings grant, this funding has not been approved. Additionally, bridge work is a longer game, with the county currently applying for fiscal year 2028 funding. However, Peck said if the work is approved by the state and all goes well, the project could go out for bid as early as the summer of 2025.
The commissioners approved the local portion of funding.