[0:00] I'd like to welcome everybody to the Town

[0:02] of Salpich Animal Control Shelter Building Committee, Thursday,

[0:08] August 27, 2026 at 6 p.m. Vice

[0:12] Conference Room, First Agenda Roll Calls, Carlisle, here.

[0:17] Are you here?

[0:18] Are your tees absent?

[0:21] Your Provost?

[0:23] Present.

[0:24] Chief?

[0:25] Here.

[0:26] Katie?

[0:27] Here.

[0:31] Josh, are you excused?

[0:32] Alex?

[0:33] Here.

[0:35] Okay, moving on to...

[0:37] Who are the medics?

[0:38] Jack, do we have any medics?

[0:39] No, unfortunately I wasn't able to get them

[0:41] finalized today.

[0:42] I apologize.

[0:43] Okay, we'll take them up on that meeting.

[0:45] I thought I had one, buddy.

[0:46] You're fired.

[0:46] Moving on to number three, review and discuss

[0:49] the following and take any action.

[0:52] Chris with an update on MEP, building project

[0:56] design, and construction dollars.

[1:00] Chris?

[1:01] Okay, so, yeah, we provided...

[1:04] So, we didn't go out to formal estimates

[1:07] on this because of the...

[1:09] I'm sure Alex is in the business, and

[1:11] Sky is in the business.

[1:12] It's like a moving target.

[1:14] So, we go and pay somebody the $10

[1:19] ,000 that we were going to do it.

[1:21] We literally talked to these people, like, you

[1:23] know, we're going to tell you this today

[1:24] and tomorrow it's going to change.

[1:26] Like, you know, pull together an estimate.

[1:29] What you're looking at is probably on a

[1:30] high side conservative where we want to be.

[1:33] If you're looking for funding, you know, it

[1:34] doesn't always look great when you go off

[1:36] the initial set of funding, but at least

[1:37] you'll be covered for the project that you

[1:39] have going on.

[1:40] And then, you know, see how that, you

[1:43] know, see...

[1:44] Well, you've really got to put it to

[1:46] bed to find out what you're going to

[1:47] fund.

[1:47] So, what we did was use our opinions

[1:50] of profitable cost.

[1:53] From the site side, my perspective is I

[1:56] use all mass DOT budgets for projects that

[2:02] occurred in the past, from present back to

[2:05] two years.

[2:06] So, I'm talking about moving materials.

[2:08] So, really it is the municipal jobs that

[2:11] are using actual estimates that have been made

[2:15] for projects that have been completed.

[2:17] But, again, those are street jobs, right?

[2:20] Like a project.

[2:21] So, if you...

[2:23] It's likely, again, probably it's a conservative estimate

[2:26] where we exactly want to be, but there's

[2:29] probably going to be some savings in there

[2:31] because you're going to have someone coming and

[2:32] going and going.

[2:33] As long as you're following all the public

[2:35] procurement, you have to pay for building wages,

[2:38] but you're not always seeing the same swings

[2:41] you would see for a big highway project.

[2:43] But that's where we have to come from,

[2:45] our estimates, because that's basically where the numbers

[2:48] have come from.

[2:51] No, I think that makes sense.

[2:56] Again, it definitely probably seems like it's probably

[2:58] aligned with a road construction project versus a

[3:00] site development plan.

[3:02] I was looking through and just curious about

[3:05] the site conditions themselves, how much that contributes

[3:09] to some of those, but nothing really seemed

[3:11] like crazy.

[3:12] I don't know.

[3:13] To me, it seemed like you were being

[3:14] conservative, as you mentioned.

[3:17] The only thing that really stuck out to

[3:19] me on the building side, which I don't

[3:20] know if you want to talk separately about

[3:21] that, but on the building side, the only

[3:25] concern I have is some of the specialty

[3:27] items because those can be, out of left

[3:30] field, expensive.

[3:32] So the dog doors, that could be $10

[3:34] ,000, that could be $40,000.

[3:36] I was like, no idea.

[3:38] Yeah.

[3:38] So those are some of the items that

[3:40] just stuck out to me.

[3:41] I think specialty-wise, that would be Pamling.

[3:44] I'm sure it's probably not too far off.

[3:47] And then I saw there was just a

[3:48] couple of square foot estimates at the bottom

[3:50] based on a bunch of different values.

[3:52] I wasn't sure if there was any insight

[3:54] as to where those values came from.

[3:56] Yeah.

[3:57] That would just—and Jake Align is the architect.

[4:00] He's pulled those off at his number.

[4:02] He's sort of basically doing the same type

[4:03] stuff that did Zazai.

[4:05] It's kind of how we have to run

[4:07] it on most recent projects and keep that

[4:10] as up-to-date.

[4:11] Yeah, it's an interesting mix because it's a

[4:13] commercial building, but a lot of construction is

[4:16] kind of more residential construction-style.

[4:17] Right, right.

[4:18] So I think, again, I can't tell you

[4:24] how much it costs to build an animal

[4:26] control shelter per square foot necessarily, but I

[4:30] think figuring out where those—what informs that is

[4:33] definitely helpful in determining if it's an accurate

[4:37] estimate.

[4:37] Right.

[4:40] Any other questions?

[4:42] Is there anything that suffers DAW to do

[4:46] to cut the cost on this?

[4:47] I mean, anything.

[4:50] So, I mean, from a public procurement perspective,

[4:54] it's tough.

[4:55] I mean, it comes from the chief procurement

[4:57] officer that says, okay, can we break this

[4:59] up?

[5:00] Can we get something done internally?

[5:02] Have them look at how— And that's really—anytime

[5:09] you get into a situation like this, they

[5:11] say, well, as long as it's good with

[5:13] the chief procurement officer and we get buy

[5:16] -in from that DAW, then we can say,

[5:18] hey, this is what we're looking for.

[5:20] Can you prep this pad for us?

[5:23] If that's really what we're looking to have

[5:26] them do.

[5:26] And then we can do it to cut

[5:27] the cost.

[5:28] That's what I'm wondering.

[5:31] In the realm of— Well, that would be

[5:33] okay, but then you hire the contractor, then

[5:36] it's not how people would expect that you

[5:38] did.

[5:39] I mean, I don't know in what perspective—

[5:42] Like site preparedness.

[5:44] That's what I'm thinking.

[5:45] We've got all the equipment to do site

[5:48] preparedness, don't we?

[5:51] This one I'm going to say no.

[5:52] Yeah.

[5:53] We have a ledge at a very shallow

[5:55] grade with ledges, so there's going to be

[5:59] a hammer blasting, which I think it would

[6:02] probably be a hammer, but that is a

[6:04] different tool than— I didn't notice that.

[6:09] When you go onto the site and you

[6:12] lay it out, you're going to do the

[6:13] foundation, you've already done the deep hole test.

[6:16] You've already researched where the subject is.

[6:18] That's Toronto.

[6:19] Right.

[6:20] So for us, it's more or less blowing

[6:23] a hole into the ledge that we can

[6:25] get some foundation in.

[6:26] Yeah.

[6:28] And I don't think they have the capacity.

[6:29] No, they don't.

[6:30] It's probably a difficult part of balancing.

[6:33] Like, your budget needs to be as low

[6:34] as it can be.

[6:36] Because we're abetting the project between the general

[6:39] and the DBW.

[6:41] Yeah, because they're going to pull off the

[6:43] plan if they have some emergency content.

[6:45] Right.

[6:45] And you're just trying to get a pad,

[6:46] a simple pad, and pull it down.

[6:48] I think where we've got to go is

[6:49] we've got to find out what the actual

[6:50] number is.

[6:52] What is it?

[6:52] How many square feet is the building?

[6:54] 3,000.

[6:55] 3,000?

[6:55] Yeah.

[6:58] I gave the prints to a contractor to

[7:01] look at it, and then we plugged in

[7:02] the numbers, and they thought it was about

[7:04] $500,000 high.

[7:06] But again, this contractor deals in commercial work

[7:10] and stuff like that.

[7:13] Yeah.

[7:13] And I'm going to agree with you 100%.

[7:14] Yeah.

[7:15] These numbers are going to be all over

[7:16] the place.

[7:17] You know, 3,000 square foot building, and

[7:19] gentlemen were talking about it, and he told

[7:21] me this idea, okay.

[7:23] But then, I know Jeff and I have

[7:25] a little bit of experience with how the

[7:27] bids come in.

[7:28] You know, we did the middle high school.

[7:29] We did the fire station.

[7:31] You know, go for a rebid.

[7:33] You know, there's a lot of chess pieces

[7:34] to move around.

[7:35] But the thing is, on this one here,

[7:37] I think, there's a lot of money that's

[7:40] been donated, and there's still people that want

[7:43] to donate heavy money, and I'm turning around

[7:47] and going, I don't have a solid number

[7:50] to tell anybody.

[7:51] Yeah.

[7:51] So, to me, I think we've got to

[7:53] go to the next step, which is going

[7:55] to cost money, and this is why we're

[7:57] here.

[7:57] We're going to discuss, do we want to

[7:59] go to the next step, which is, you

[8:01] know, a bid process.

[8:04] You know, how long will it take.

[8:06] Yeah, I mean, we're all in line to,

[8:08] this is all, we're in line to stop

[8:10] pulling bid docs, because we just have them,

[8:12] because we didn't want to start charging town

[8:14] if they weren't going to put it on

[8:15] the street.

[8:16] Yeah, because I think it's 6 and 1

[8:17] 1⁄2, because, yeah, it would be great to

[8:20] have, like, a realistic number, but to this

[8:22] point, by the time we get the money

[8:24] in line, is that going to be the

[8:25] realistic number anymore?

[8:26] Or are you low, because you were basing

[8:29] it off of bids from months ago?

[8:30] That's part of the construction of the world.

[8:33] Oh, yeah.

[8:34] But, if I may, we're not going to

[8:37] go out to bid if we don't have

[8:39] the money allocated to the project, because then

[8:44] you're out to bid, and you don't have

[8:45] the funding to do it.

[8:46] So, it's going to have to be presented

[8:48] to the council of how you're going to

[8:50] fund this.

[8:51] Right.

[8:51] Because we could throw it out on a

[8:52] bid, and if the bid's coming in too

[8:53] high, now you've got to change the scope,

[8:55] because you can't rebid the same job.

[8:59] So, unless you make a change, a substantive

[9:01] change.

[9:03] So, like, for the fire station, when we

[9:04] did that, our first bid package was the

[9:06] fire station, alternates and all that, but it

[9:10] was all that included demolition of the properties

[9:13] where the original bid documents were.

[9:15] When we went out the second time, it

[9:17] was a built-in, and all that demolition

[9:20] was out, and that type of work was

[9:22] out of it, and so that was enough

[9:23] of a substantive change in the bid documents

[9:25] that we didn't have to change the scope

[9:26] of the building anyway, because it was, like,

[9:30] we took a substantial portion out of the

[9:32] project.

[9:33] So, that's the caution, right?

[9:35] So, is it you invest $10,000, like

[9:37] you say, and get an actual closer cost,

[9:40] then go to council?

[9:42] Is that what you do?

[9:43] Or do you go to council and say,

[9:45] hey, the opinion problem cost is $2.1,

[9:47] but we only have $475,000 left.

[9:51] Where's the $1.7?

[9:53] But I think that number's way high.

[9:55] Well, how do you determine that?

[9:57] By going out to bid.

[9:58] But then you're going to have to have

[10:00] town council support.

[10:01] How do you find that?

[10:02] So, not trying to dissuade anybody, but you

[10:06] can't go out to bid unless you have,

[10:08] how do you fund the project?

[10:12] How much money do we have right now?

[10:15] A little bit undefined.

[10:20] We're getting more from...

[10:22] But you can't go out to bid, say,

[10:23] right?

[10:23] Yeah, we don't even live.

[10:25] One of the fun things was, it says

[10:27] how much do you need.

[10:30] How good of a relationship does the town

[10:32] have with any of the general contractors that

[10:34] were not working recently?

[10:36] They might be willing to give you some

[10:38] pretty good estimates at no cost.

[10:45] A lot of late work for $0.

[10:49] Yeah.

[10:50] So, people want you guys on a time

[10:51] track sort of thing?

[10:52] Yeah, because they want to be in your

[10:55] good graces, so that you're happy.

[10:57] If we want to go down that road

[10:59] beforehand, I'd ship this off to our owner's

[11:02] project manager.

[11:04] Does a lot of the design, and if

[11:05] I have good, at least baseline documents they

[11:07] can give me that, we can send to

[11:09] him.

[11:10] Rick Pomeroy does a very good job.

[11:11] They're very good on...

[11:13] That's the owner's project manager.

[11:15] Yeah, the fire station.

[11:15] And they'll probably do that estimate for you.

[11:19] I mean, again, we didn't want to go

[11:21] to an estimated knowledge gap because...

[11:23] He may be able to just take a

[11:24] quick look at it Yeah, your risk is

[11:27] a lot lower because you have a set

[11:28] drawing.

[11:29] It's not like you're at a 50%

[11:30] set drawing.

[11:32] You're going to come back and...

[11:35] It's probably enough for them to be able

[11:38] to...

[11:39] Yeah, just give a baseline, because they're out

[11:42] there bidding on the public side, not just

[11:43] the commercial side.

[11:44] They're bidding on the public side.

[11:46] If we had some good scope of, okay,

[11:48] it's a septic, the waterline is this, this

[11:52] is the site, what is the general site

[11:54] work, what is all that?

[11:56] Yeah, you build in some sort of escalation

[11:58] anticipating that you're not going to actually buy

[12:00] the project until, say, a year later or

[12:02] something along those lines.

[12:03] And that's essentially right on your contingency of

[12:07] 5% escalation, anticipating that next year it's

[12:10] going to cost 5% more to build.

[12:11] So if you send a PDF to Jack

[12:14] to give to Pomeroy, that would be a...

[12:16] Send you this site, the architectural, and the...

[12:22] And I'll ask them, I'll see if they'll

[12:24] do it for us with no cost and

[12:26] go from there.

[12:28] Just so you can...

[12:30] I mean, I think it's not going to

[12:31] go into big detail.

[12:33] They'll be able to just look at it

[12:34] pretty quick and go, okay, I know...

[12:35] There'll still be unit rates and all that

[12:36] stuff.

[12:37] Yeah, of course.

[12:37] But it'll be forked off of hopefully something

[12:39] that's slightly dialed in.

[12:42] It'll be a much more scientific process than

[12:44] what we've been practicing so far.

[12:46] And I have mentioned to Tom...

[12:46] They're not giving you any different answers.

[12:49] I have mentioned to Tom that he was

[12:51] willing to take a look at it.

[12:52] I just need more details as to what

[12:54] I've said to him.

[13:01] Excuse me, I have a question.

[13:04] Go ahead.

[13:04] Actually, I have two.

[13:06] Why would the doors be so expensive?

[13:09] You said that they would vary from $1

[13:12] ,000 to $4,000?

[13:14] The dog doors?

[13:15] Oh, I was saying the...

[13:17] Yeah, the...

[13:17] Just specialty items in general, I guess.

[13:20] Any really specialized that you're not installing all

[13:23] the time, you have a really difficult time

[13:25] estimating what that cost would be without actually

[13:27] getting somebody to give you a price.

[13:29] Really?

[13:30] Yeah.

[13:30] Oh, okay.

[13:32] And I assume those are just like the

[13:34] doors that let dogs out?

[13:36] Yeah, but I think, if I'm not mistaken,

[13:38] you were saying they have a pulley system

[13:39] so you don't have to actually be in

[13:40] there to open the door.

[13:42] It's a little more complicated than a dog

[13:44] door.

[13:45] Oh, okay.

[13:45] Yeah, because they seem cheaper at a pet

[13:49] store.

[13:49] Yeah, of course.

[13:50] So I was like, wow.

[13:52] And my second question is, I haven't been

[13:55] at these meetings in a long time.

[13:57] Are there any changes of proximity to the

[14:02] roof or any of the buildings?

[14:06] I mean, really, I don't think I've been

[14:09] here since last February.

[14:12] Yeah, these are the same ones that were

[14:14] submitted and approved through planning and constitution.

[14:18] Yeah.

[14:18] Oh, okay.

[14:19] No changes?

[14:20] No.

[14:21] Okay.

[14:22] Thank you.

[14:23] Sure.

[14:25] Hey, Chris.

[14:26] I'm going to move on.

[14:27] We talked about reviewing preliminary cost estimates, the

[14:31] funding, update on the bid process.

[14:34] If, Jack, you take a look at that

[14:36] hypothetically, what are we talking?

[14:39] Say he comes through with a projected number

[14:43] and we go with his number and we

[14:46] say, we think we're going to go forward

[14:49] with this.

[14:50] From the time we go off to bid,

[14:52] what are we talking timeframe-wise?

[14:54] So we have to pull the documents together

[14:57] and then there's usually a standard 30, 60,

[15:00] 90, depending upon, because, again, Jack's office tells

[15:03] us, okay, we want to give folks 30

[15:05] days to review this and 60 days to

[15:07] review it, get the bids in by then,

[15:10] whether they need We did 30 the first

[15:13] time.

[15:13] We did 30 the first time.

[15:15] So, you know, the MEPs are ready to

[15:18] pull the bid documents together.

[15:19] I'm ready to pull the bid documents together.

[15:21] So that could be within a month, we

[15:22] could have everything together fully.

[15:25] And then it's just I'll lay out the

[15:27] timeframe for standard bidding.

[15:30] It's going to be bid for two weeks.

[15:31] It's going to be, you know, review.

[15:37] So that's usually a few-month process.

[15:39] And then at this point in time, you

[15:41] could, you know, get construction ready for the

[15:46] spring if we had everything in place.

[15:48] Perfect time, this time of year to do

[15:50] everything.

[15:52] People, when it's in, then they're just setting

[15:54] this work aside, maybe the first job, or

[15:56] whatever else, but at least they're, you know,

[16:00] this is a good time for bidding anyways.

[16:02] The spring.

[16:05] And then the site would allow them.

[16:08] The site would allow this at any time

[16:09] because it's not in the world.

[16:11] You know what I'm saying?

[16:12] If they wanted to move in and move

[16:13] in during the wintertime, there wasn't, they're out.

[16:17] Is it fair to say that the whole

[16:18] building is going to be on ledge?

[16:22] It won't be on ledge, but it's going

[16:25] to be close.

[16:26] I mean, the footings and everything will be

[16:28] pretty much on ledge.

[16:30] Right.

[16:30] So in the wintertime, ledge doesn't freeze.

[16:34] I'm just thinking about your company did a

[16:36] high school, and there was no ledge.

[16:39] The winterization was tremendous.

[16:42] Expensive.

[16:44] Following the ground is not a good idea.

[16:45] Yeah.

[16:47] Did we have to follow the ground?

[16:48] Because I thought we had a good spring.

[16:51] There were envelopes.

[16:51] No.

[16:54] Everything went well under budget, on time, with

[16:57] what I got, but when you're dealing with

[16:59] a palm field, when you're dealing with bedrock,

[17:01] it took two different worlds.

[17:03] And maybe that's aggressive, but like I said,

[17:07] sometimes the state says you can't go on

[17:08] the road April 15th, but we don't mean

[17:10] to wait until April 15th, because they're off

[17:12] in the backfield.

[17:14] They're not in anybody's way, really.

[17:16] It's whatever they do their work.

[17:22] We're going to get the PDFs out.

[17:25] I'll get it from him.

[17:28] I'm rolling to you to be ready very

[17:29] good.

[17:31] All right.

[17:31] So at this point, we'll move on to

[17:34] any other discussion.

[17:36] If not, moving on to four, approval of

[17:39] any invoices to be submitted to the finance

[17:42] department, payment from McClure.

[17:45] This is just an invoice for Chris for

[17:47] $2,990.

[17:51] Invoice number 22970.

[17:55] Sorry for the delay.

[17:57] At least it's a small number for you.

[18:01] What's it for?

[18:02] It was for the last revision.

[18:05] It's all in line with our contract.

[18:07] So we haven't touched the bidding.

[18:09] The next thing for us to do is

[18:10] start the bidding process so that money doesn't

[18:12] set aside.

[18:13] So we heard the finalization of it.

[18:15] What was that number again, Jack?

[18:17] $2,990.

[18:19] A motion.

[18:20] It's a motion to pay invoice for $2

[18:24] ,990.

[18:26] Do I have a second?

[18:27] Second.

[18:27] Alex seconds it.

[18:29] Any discussion?

[18:31] All those in favor?

[18:33] Opposed?

[18:34] Unanimous, all present.

[18:37] Discussion of the next meeting day.

[18:40] Do you want to wait until we retrieve

[18:41] that?

[18:42] Yeah, I guess, yeah.

[18:43] We should have a quick turnaround, but I'll

[18:45] put it in today.

[18:46] Sounds good.

[18:47] Motion to adjourn?

[18:48] Motion.

[18:49] Second.

[18:50] All in favor?

[18:51] Opposed?

[18:52] Where's the motion?

[18:53] I'm sorry.

[18:54] I motion.

[18:54] Second.

[18:55] I second.

Southbridge Animal Control Shelter Building Committee - 8/27/26

Transcript