Elevator down at HSC courthouse

Citizens needing to do work in the Hot Springs County Courthouse will find the elevator is currently out of service.

Issues with the elevator had been coming more frequently, however, over the weekend it became a safety issue when the elevator began moving too quickly up and down the shaft with no gentle start or stop.

Maintenance head Chuck Carver contacted an elevator company in Colorado that repairs this particular brand of elevator and through a troubleshooting process with them determined there is a problem with a spring in the mechanism that affects the ascent and descent of the elevator.

Carver told the commissioners there were two options for repair.

The first option would bring the mechanic from Denver in immediately, costing approximately $12,000. The second option would be considerably less costly, however, it means the elevator will be out of commission for about a week.

The commissioners determined the second, least costly option would be the best way to go and a memo will be sent to all the offices beyond the first floor informing them of the situation. Each office will make arrangements to come to the first floor to help citizens who are unable to use the stairs during the elevator outage.

The commissioners opened three bid proposals from local banks to fund the new fuel tanks that will need to be installed at the airport.

Big Horn Federal presented two options, the first in the amount of $300,000 at 2.789% over a ten-year period.

The bank also presented a second option of a mixed rate loan for the same amount, giving an interest rate of 2.564% for the first five years of the note and a higher interest rate of 3.15% for the remaining five years.

The commissioners want to be able to pay the note off by 2019, less than the 10 years offered by the banks, so the second option from Big Horn Federal was the approved bid.

With this step in place, GDA Engineers can now move ahead with the bidding process for the tanks themselves.

GDA will be sending the bid documents to the State Fire Marshall's office as well as the Department of Environmental Quality in order to get their input into the project. Doing this will hopefully prevent any unforseen roadblocks popping up during the construction process.

The commissioners also met with a few members of the public regarding the sale and lease of the hangars at the airport.

Current leaseholders will have first option to purchase and move the hangars from their location on top of Airport Hill to the new airport. Leaseholders who do not wish to purchase their hangars may turn them down, opening them up to purchase by the public.

A new lease agreement was discussed at length by the commissioners with input from the public during the meeting. County attorney Jerry Williams will go through the draft document to make sure everything is legal.

The new lease agreements will be made available to the current leaseholders and the public once Williams has approved it.

The commissioners finished Tuesday evening’s meeting by going into executive session.

After returning from executive session the commissioners voted unanimously to accept an offer from attorneys representing TRANE, the company which installed heating, cooling and other money saving items within various county buildings.

The county has been experiencing issues with the heating and cooling elements installed in the courthouse and have withheld final $80,795 payment to TRANE until the issues were corrected.

An additional $23,308 in interest had been added to the bill by the company, making it $104,104.

After a number of letters of intent had gone back and forth between TRANE’s attorneys and Williams, a final settlement was reached, wherein the county will pay TRANE $75,000.