GOSHEN – Orange County is moving ahead with the remodeling of the vacant Government Center in Goshen.
In an Orange County Building Committee meeting Monday, discussion on the interior colors, outside siding and value engineering plumbing solutions for the building were discussed.
Legislators are closing in on a final design decision
Legislative Chairman Stephen Brescia, said they are trying to keep as much of the architectural flavor as possible.
“Everybody had a little bit of input on that so to try to keep some of the tastes of Paul Rudolph and what was there before,” Brescia said.
The county is under threat of a lawsuit, from attorney Michael Sussman, if there are substantial changes to the Rudolph design.
The interior colors have not been decided upon yet but, it has been decided that divisions one and three of the Rudolph building will have a metal siding installed to stay true to the original design but with a new spin. The value of engineering solutions for the building’s plumbing are estimated to save about $1 million off the project cost.
Some county legislators are concerned with the way the project planning
and negotiations have been progressing. Roseanne Sullivan submitted a
resolution to have the contract between the county and architect Clark
Patterson Lee made available to the legislature during their last legislative
session, something she said has not been made available to them yet.
“I don’t mean to say that there is a huge opposition but, there are many concerns,” said Sullivan. “These concerns need to be brought to light and they need to be compared next to the actual contract.” She said the county executive will not give a copy of the contract to the legislature.
Despite concern, the project is moving forward and Brescia said that the work should begin in the next few months.
“The bids for demolition came in a little higher than expected but, we’re very confident we’re going to save in the next phases of construction,” said Brescia.
The immediate next step for this part of the project is County Executive Steven Neuhaus signing off on it which is expected to happen in the next couple weeks..
