Wenatchee City Hall Remodel Delayed Due to Costs

The Wenatchee City Council voted to reject all bids for the remodel of City Hall on Thursday.

Facilities Manager Elisa Webb spoke at the meeting and said that the closest possibly acceptable bid was about $3.5 million more than they expected.

"That's a 17% increase over what we had budgeted. COVID-19 may have had an effect and upon further review we also know that there were some internal components that were over budget."

Mayor Frank Kuntz says there are some different approaches they can take going forward, including waiting out the pandemic for a better environment, or doing the project in smaller pieces amongst others.

"We're finding that labor costs are OK but there's no materials. The material costs are off the chart. So what's going to happen, of course, is the material people are going to get caught up and then the labor is going to go [up]. I don't feel like we're going to settle in a spot that's drastically better, other than I think we need to start thinking about how we might piecemeal this."

Five companies put in bids with the only one the city could consider coming from Cascade Central Construction for $11.3 million.