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College
approves new roofing projects Editor-in-Chief Missouri
Southern will soon be raising the roof - literally. Matthews
and Taylor Halls will be re-roofed due to leakage and damage. The
one in Taylor is in really bad shape, said Bob Harrington, director
of the physical plant. We ve had several leaks in it we ve been
trying to resolve. We ve patched it a couple times, but the leaks keep
coming back. We had it on the schedule to repair last year, but with the
governor s cuts, the budget wasn t available to do it, so we had to
put it off until this year. Dr.
Terri Agee, vice president for business affairs, said the maintenance
department was one of the most heavily cut departments on campus last
year. Harrington
said the roof on Matthews Hall is not currently leaking, but it has some
significant blisters that could soon become leaks. Jim
Gray, dean of the school of business, said he has noticed some leaking,
which has been an ongoing problem for years. The
re-roofing projects on both buildings are considered capital projects,
projects on campus that cost at least $15,000. The College received its
capital projects budget at the beginning of the fiscal year in July, and
Matthews and Taylor Halls were on the top of the list. We
had started off the fiscal year last year fully intending on doing these
roofs, but when the governor announced the withholdings, everything got
put on hold, Agee said. [This was] anything that wasn t an
absolute emergency to put on hold. The
completion of East Hall was considered an emergency last year, but Agee
said this year, the roofs can no longer be put on hold. What
this boils down to is, if we don t pay now, we re going to have to
pay more later, she said. If you keep deferring payment, you get
into that situation. Following
the approval of the re-roofing, specifications were made for the job,
then public bids were sent out. The bidders were given two to three
weeks to look at the specifications and were allowed to inspect the
roofs themselves. The
project was awarded to the lowest bidder, Stiles Roofing Inc., of
Lebanon. It is the same company that roofed the Leggett & Platt
Athletic Center. The
Matthews Hall job will cost $113,529, and Taylor Hall will take $81,880. The
bids came in a little higher than we had hoped, Agee said. I hate
to spend precious money on leaks. There s a lot more visible
improvements we could make, but it s pretty critical. Depending
on weather, construction on both buildings will begin the week of Oct.
14. Harrington said the re-roofing will take at least 60 days between
both buildings. We re
just glad to finally be able to do it, he said. The
construction will occur during the day, but Harrington does not expect
any problems with disturbances to classes. They ll
set up their staging area in a location around the building where it s
not a problem, he said. They ll smell it, probably, because they
use a hot tar mixture, but it won t create any problems. Jennica
Sorensen and Anna Johnson, sophomore music majors, spend much of their
time in Taylor Hall and are glad the roof will soon be replaced. They
agree the construction will not cause too many disturbances. There s
always something going on, so one more thing isn t going to make much
of a difference, Johnson said. Sorensen
said the new roof will make the building more attractive, and Johnson
said heating and cooling will become much more efficient. Agee
said if disturbances do become a problem, the College will make
adjustments such as moving the time of day construction takes place. Agee
also said although the roofing projects are top priorities, other
projects are questionable. Everything
else is kind of up in the air, on hold, waiting to see if we re going
to get further withholdings, she said. We re in a time of
uncertainty. |