Bids for Outside and Interior Work for New Prairie du Sac Library Come in $500,000+ Over Budget

PdS board rejects bids for library work. (Sauk Prairie Eagle, 8/3/2011)

Excerpt:    The Prairie du Sac Public Library is more than $500,000 shy of the money needed to build the kind of dream home that could sustain it for the foreseeable future.

First, explained village administrator Alan Wildman, the bids for the outside work necessary to prepare the old Culver's building at 540 Water St. for a small addition came in $110,000 over what the library building committee had budgeted.

Then the bids for remodeling the building's interior came in about $400,000 over what was budgeted.

"All in total, with the two bids that came in, there was about $524,000 over the available funds," Wildman said.

Between public money earmarked for the library by the village board and donations, the library has about $2.25 million in its coffers.

Wildman said it's not clear what caused the bids to come in so much higher than anticipated.

"It's not like we didn't get enough bids," Wildman said. "On the building project, we had seven bidders. The site work had a good number of bidders on it, too."

Wildman said it could be the case that the economy is picking up, so work isn't as scarce as it once was, taking some of the pressure off contractors to submit rock-bottom low bids.

Related articles:
Site work boosts costs of new library.  (6/22/2011)
Library project to get underway this year.  (1/19/2011)
$500,000 gift boosts Prairie du Sac's Library fundraising effort.  (10/26/2010)
Building committee votes to extend fundraising effort for new Prairie du Sac library.  (8/23/2010)
The Ruth Culver Memorial Library.  (6/4/2009)
Culver's donates facility for new Prairie du Sac Library.  (5/22/2009)