Putting a mark on history

CLINTON — The final beam has been hung for the Sampson County 911 and Emergency Services Center project after a brief beam-signing and “topping out” ceremony Monday afternoon.

County leaders, members of the community, EMS workers, and more joined with staff from Monteith Construction to celebrate the occasion and sign the beam that was officially affixed around 4:45 p.m.

The pandemic has hindered progress and inflated prices, yet the team isn’t letting that get in their way.

“Thank you for coming out here,” said Matt Brittan, Project Manager, at Monday’s ceremony. “It means a lot to the Monteith Construction team.”

About six months ago, a groundbreaking ceremony was held on the other side of the lot, next to the Sheriff’s Office on Fontana Street.

The facility will be 36,000 square feet and will house the county’s 911 telecommunications, emergency medical services, emergency management operations, fire marshal and addressing services, along with the emergency operations center.

The public safety facility was designed by ADW Architects of Charlotte, with engineering by the Stewart, Benesch and Optima companies. Consultation and planning services for 911 telecommunication design and migration has been provided by Mission Critical Partners.

“We have had a lot of hard work,” Brittan said. “We are looking forward to finishing this.”

They have about 100 tons of structural steel and 50 tons of joists, he said. Later this week they will be pouring the pads for the equipment in one of the buildings. They are having to pour them in sections to make it so that they can adjust the grades for water runoff and such.

Right now the expectation is that it will be completed in June of next year.

“We appreciate you all,” said Sampson County Board Chairman Clark Wooten. “This is good that this is going here.”

Back in April the roughly $18 million project broke ground next to the Sampson County Detention Center on Fontana Street.

Over half than half the funding for the project will come from grants. That includes a $5.5 million PSAP Disaster Recovery Grant, $1 million from Golden LEAF and $3.5 million from a N.C. Office of State Budget and Management Disaster Recovery Grant.

“Currently right now we are finishing the structural steel and erection on the project,” Brittan said.

They are close to finishing the light gauge framing on the outside he said, as well as on the inside as well.

He said that COVID has had a great impact on the process.

“[It’s affected] everything from material availability to cost escalation to labor shortages,” said Brittan. “It’s made things more challenging at times, absolutely.”

This has changed a few things from the routine, and he said that usually they know what the long lead items are, the items that they need more time to procure usually. Now that COVID has come into play, there are lots of items that might be on that list that aren’t usually on the list.

Paul Jeffries, who is in charge of scheduling and risk management, said that those supply issues are their biggest problem they have had.

“You hear about ships being stuck and cannot dock,” said Jeffries. “They have ceramic tile, all kinds of stuff that we just can’t get.”

“We have been working through that,” said Jeffries. “Roofing has been a major problem.”

He said that he thinks they have just gotten past that.

“We are placing the concrete slabs in the apparatus bays this week,” Brittan added.

“We are on track for our roofing in the middle of November and the exterior brick veneer as well,” said Brittan.

“I think we are in pretty good shape,” said Jeffries.

Jeffries confirmed that that next step is getting those outside walls framed, and getting those interior slabs poured in the apparatus building. From there it’s getting the roof on so the building can be dried in.

“Then the hangers can start on roughing in the interior walls and then the overhead,” said Jeffries.

“New materials are becoming a long lead, a scarcity,” Brittan said. “It’s the surprises of the unknowns of the materials that are becoming no longer available that we take for granted that are usually in hand.”

When ground was broken at the site earlier this year, Monteith Construction representatives said they expected to complete the project in 14 months, with a ribbon-cutting targeted for summer of 2022.