Clarification on Wellman and Zuck | Letters

Published 12:26 pm Tuesday, July 21, 2015

(Editor’s note: An earlier version of the Spring Street Landing article mentioned a concern amongst the commissioners. The concern was from one commissioner.)

In the Journal article regarding the new “Spring Street  Building,” Greg Hertel is quoted: “There were some concerns amongst the commissioners about choosing Wellman Zuck (as the contractor) because of delays on their construction…such as the IMA museum.”

I sympathize with Greg for making that comment since I’m sure he was unaware that in the very early stages of the effort the time projections were extremely tentative since there was there was so much we didn’t know about the old EMS building.

There were a lot of unpleasant surprises that were not at all apparent initially, but nevertheless starting with the EMS building was still a sound move. Once we got into the gut of the project however, and a lot of “unknowns” became “knows”, things went quite smoothly and a critical completion date was basically met. The cost estimates incidentally came in exactly on budget.

I feel compelled to clarify the situation, since we look back on the relationship with Wellman Zuck as having been outstanding, and we feel they did a great job on building our museum. I suspect they will do the town proud on their efforts on the new building.

Charlie Bodenstab

Board President, IMA