MONROE - Members of the Airport Board of Management received disappointing news about the city's new terminal construction project earlier this week.
Contractors' bids to build the 1,650-square-foot terminal were about $200,000 above the anticipated cost of $600,000, according to City Administrator Phil Rath.
Construction will now be delayed and the terminal will probably not be finished by the end of the year.
Three companies bid about the same price on the project. An optional, 350-square-foot community meeting room with a separate entry, estimated at additional $150,000, was bid at $134,000.
Rath said board members were "surprised and disappointed."
Bids were opened Thursday, May 23 in Madison by the Wisconsin Bureau of Aeronautics, which oversees the project. The bureau approved the costs estimates and is "checking for reasons for the high bids," Rath said.
The bureau is also looking into other options for the city, such as swapping its future federal aviation funding entitlements with another city's unused funds, he added.
The city has about $600,000, saving part or all of its annual federal funds since 2009, to use toward the terminal project. But the earliest saved amount, about $50,000, must be used soon or it will revert to the Federal Aviation Administration.
The airport board meet later in June to hear about its options.
About 94 percent of the terminal construction cost is covered by federal funding administered through the state. The city and state pay matching amounts for the remainder. Federal funding is generated by aviation fuel taxes and produces about $150,000 per year for the Monroe airport.
The state determines which airports projects it will build each year, and gives runways first priority for its funded projects. The Monroe airport runways and ramp are in good shape, which is why it is allowed to use its saved funds for the terminal. The Monroe terminal is only one of three in the state approved last year.
Contractors' bids to build the 1,650-square-foot terminal were about $200,000 above the anticipated cost of $600,000, according to City Administrator Phil Rath.
Construction will now be delayed and the terminal will probably not be finished by the end of the year.
Three companies bid about the same price on the project. An optional, 350-square-foot community meeting room with a separate entry, estimated at additional $150,000, was bid at $134,000.
Rath said board members were "surprised and disappointed."
Bids were opened Thursday, May 23 in Madison by the Wisconsin Bureau of Aeronautics, which oversees the project. The bureau approved the costs estimates and is "checking for reasons for the high bids," Rath said.
The bureau is also looking into other options for the city, such as swapping its future federal aviation funding entitlements with another city's unused funds, he added.
The city has about $600,000, saving part or all of its annual federal funds since 2009, to use toward the terminal project. But the earliest saved amount, about $50,000, must be used soon or it will revert to the Federal Aviation Administration.
The airport board meet later in June to hear about its options.
About 94 percent of the terminal construction cost is covered by federal funding administered through the state. The city and state pay matching amounts for the remainder. Federal funding is generated by aviation fuel taxes and produces about $150,000 per year for the Monroe airport.
The state determines which airports projects it will build each year, and gives runways first priority for its funded projects. The Monroe airport runways and ramp are in good shape, which is why it is allowed to use its saved funds for the terminal. The Monroe terminal is only one of three in the state approved last year.