Bus garage work on hold; bids are double allocation

The Alleghany County Board of Education voted Oct. 27 to turn down all the bids received on a new school bus garage after they came in at twice the allocation for the building.

The board had requested $250,000 from the county about two years ago for the project, which was then approved, but bids received earlier this month on the bus garage ranged from just under $500,000 to more than $650,000. Dave’s Construction of Eden made the low bid of $497,420; Hamlett Associates Inc. of Climax made a bid of $517,938; while J.R. Vannoy and Sons of West Jefferson made a bid of $655,000. “The bids were much higher than what we anticipated,” Crouse said. “With the bids being what they were on the project, my immediate response was, ‘I don’t see how we could build or accept any of those bids and go forward with this. I was very much disappointed in the bid prices.”

Joines stated, “It was certainly a shock to me. I expected the bids to be a little bit higher than what we anticipated, but certainly not like this.”

Randy Baker with Pinnacle commented, “After the bids, we were floored also, to say the least because that’s about $100 a square foot. After the bids, we were looking at the plans and we didn’t see anything that was out of the ordinary for the building."

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