County still waiting word on fate of CETC building

Whitman County is going to spend $7,200 on the engineering plans to repair the CETC building, and will then submit those plans to its insurance company, which may or may not pay for the eventual cost of repairs.

County commissioners directed facilities manager Bob Reynolds Monday to find out if the engineering costs would be reimbursed by Traveler’s Insurance, the county’s insurance company.

If so, the county has an estimate from E & J Enterprises in Pullman to engineer a repair plan for the building, which suffered extensive damage to its roof from heavy snowfall in January 2009.

The building has been mothballed since October.

The repair plan was requested by Traveler’s. The insurance company will compare the plan to the cost of constructing a new building and then make a decision on how much it will reimburse the county.

Commissioner Greg Partch said a decision on the building has taken this long because the county has not heard from Traveler’s until now, despite dozens of e-mail communications.

“We weren’t in a big yank anyway,” Partch said, noting because the building was closed for the winter, repairs were not immediately needed.

Complicating the repair outlook is the discovery that the back portion of the building was built on fill dirt. That was the determination when core borings were made at the back of the building.

The current metal pre-fab building was constructed on the site by the Elks Club in the early 1970s. It replaced the old Elks Club brick building which burned down.

The current building was built on top of the foundation of the brick building, but the back portion, approximately 10 feet, was built on fill dirt.

Shifting of that dirt compounded the roof problem, and could pose problems to the overall integrity of the structure.

Traveler’s has said it will not pay for the structural faults of the building.

County officials are waiting to see how much Traveler’s will pay for repairs.

The commissioners’ decision on whether to repair the building could stem from the estimated costs of fixing the foundation.