By Myrna Trauntvein
Times-News Correspondent
Should Nephi City Council plan for long-term use of the Old Gym as a recreation center, its current use, or should the council plan to "make-do" with the facility until something more can be built.
That must be decided before the project to replace windows in the building can be put up for bids on replacement windows which are more energy efficient.
"Sometimes an offset proposal can be made and approved," said Randy McKnight, city administrator.
He said that, after meeting with officials in the government program, it was determined that the city police department, once an LDS Seminary building, did not necessitate the need to meet the historic requirements.
McKnight said that the windows and other aspects of the building' design had been altered previously. This had been done enough that the requirements no longer needed to be considered.
However, the Old Gym and the gas department building both had maintained their original character and had their original exterior look.
The state agency operating the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant program is required to follow certain historic preservation guidelines that affect the amount and type of work that can be done with federal funds and that affect the exterior appearance of any buildings more than 50 years old.
"There is not enough money in the grant to allow us to replace all of the windows in the Old Gym with energy efficient windows that have the same look as the current windows have especially on a building which was built more than 50 years ago," he said.
One alternative for the Old Gym would be replacing windows only on the front and east sides of the building. Later the city could complete the job, as funds became available, on their own. They would then not need to adhere to the standards of the historic society.
"When the project was first let out for bid," said McKnight, "we called for bids on all three buildings as one project."
Adequate bids were not received and the council then considered bidding each building separately in hope that the uncertainty surround the historic nature of the buildings would be more easily answered when addressed one building at a time.
It was thought, at the time, that separating the bids into three different projects might be better for those bidders.
Left unresolved, after the original bids were called for a month ago which bid the three as one project, was the lighting update project at the Old Gym Recreation Center, the gas department building and the police department building.
The buildings each were constructed well over 50 years ago. That fact means that the windows now need to meet historic building requirements.
Because of that issue, there may be up to $70,000 in grant funds that will now need to be used on other projects.
The Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant (EECBG) Program, funded for the first time by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (Recovery Act) of 2009, represents a federal plan to deploy the cheapest, cleanest, and most reliable energy technologies—energy efficiency and conservation—across the country. The Program is modeled after the Community Development Block Grant program administered by the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD).
It is intended to assist U.S. cities, counties, states, territories, and Indian tribes to develop, promote, implement, and manage energy efficiency and conservation projects and programs designed to: Reduce fossil fuel emissions; reduce the total energy use of the entities; improve energy efficiency in the transportation, building, and other appropriate sectors; and create and retain jobs.
"If you decide the Old Gym should be kept and used as a recreation center, then you will need to address the seismic updating of he building.
Another project consideration is that the same amount of money could be used to install energy efficient furnaces in the city building and in the police department because both furnaces are due to be changed out soon.
Perhaps a certain number of LED street lights could also be installed.
"In the past we were not very impressed with the technology used in the LED street light," said McKnight.
However, he said, technology concerning them had changed and a more efficient system might be available than the ones first considered several years ago.
"Would the same type of light poles be used?" asked Justin Seely, council member.
That would be determined on how much such a conversion would cost, said McKnight.
"The changing of the poles might be more expensive that a change out of just the sockets and the lights," said Don Ball, city resident.
As for changing the way the Old Gym was heated, that was not a concern, said McKnight.
Brent Bowles, council member, had been concerned that the county, now that it was upgrading the furnace in the county building, would no longer provide the heat for the Old Gym.
"The county does not have a traditional furnace," said McKnight. "They will still be able to produce more heat more economically than we could. We could not put a different heating system in the Old Gym for the funds we have available, if at all."
