Housing Expansion Committee Report
The following two Reports by James Muhr, EI 350, are from Annual Meeting and the Summer Meeting of 2000.
Housing Expansion Committee Report
The following two Reports by James Muhr, EI 350, are from Annual
Meeting and the Summer Meeting of 2000.
Greeting brothers! Happy Founder's Day Y2K. Once again it is time to debate the potential layout of our proposed addition to the Epsilon Iota Chapter House at 2140 Burdett Avenue. Construction is scheduled to begin in only over a year, in May 2001.
This phase of our project, during which the final plans are being developed by our Architect, is now expected to continue until June of 2000. As most of you already know, a decision appears to have been made to allow the existing garage and driveway to remain for now, due to the prohibitive costs involved with the enlarging of the driveway to provide additional parking. These high costs are mostly the result of the extensive retaining walls, which would be required to reconfigure the driveway. While I would still like to see a future project address those issues, I believe we should vote today to approve the plan dated 3/3/00 which is attached to this report. The "divot" in the new upstairs hall is there because it is required in order to make an exit door of the proper size fit into the doorframe.
We must now decide whether we think we can afford to go to bid this fall with the plans, as currently amended. Once that decision has been made and communicated to the Architect, he can finish the Contract Documents. I would like to submit them to the City of Troy to obtain some feedback during the summer. We must find out whether a building permit can be issued based on the final Contract Documents, or if any zoning variances will be required. This would also be a good time to determine what effect the renovations would have on our tax bill. I will need some assistance from my committee members on this issue.
The next step will be to line up financing and to finalize our Contract Documents for receipt of bids. Of course, our final plans will depend on our finances. We will either have enough funds to continue as planned, or have to further reduce the scale of the project to meet our funding level, or have to postpone the actual construction until we raise sufficient funds to enable us to proceed.
At this point in time, we are still on schedule to complete the project by August 2001, providing we all continue to donate early and often to the cause. The future brothers of the Epsilon Iota Chapter will surely be grateful for our efforts. Ernie, you know what to do. Extract as much as you can from each of the brothers. Mike York, it's up to you to borrow the rest.
I remain, yours in the bonds,
James S. Muhr,
EI 350 Project Manager
Greetings, brothers! Happy summer! Depending on whether I was able to pick up the plans on my way to this meeting, it is time to debate the final layout of our proposed addition to the Epsilon Iota Chapter House at 2140 Burdett Avenue. Construction is scheduled to begin in less than a year, in May 2001.
The phase of our project during which the final plans are being developed by our Architect should now be completed. As most of you know by now, a decision was made at the Annual Meeting on April 15, 2000 to allow the existing garage and driveway to remain, due to the prohibitive costs involved with the enlarging of the driveway to provide additional parking. The plan dated 3/3/00 was then approved for construction, pending review and approval of the final Contract Documents, which is expected to occur at the 3 to 3 Meeting in October, 2000.
As many of you already know, the estimate for the project has been received and stands at $146,807.56, or as I prefer to look at it, approximately $147,000. We must now decide whether we think we can afford to go to bid this fall with the plans as currently amended. Our Architect estimated the cost at $250,000 to $300,000 to demolish the existing house and build a new one with the same layout, which appears to eliminate that course of action. In addition, he estimated the cost of the front porch portion of the project at about $9000 to $11,000, which is between 6% and 7.5% of the total cost of the project. I would like to see it built at this time, if possible. I would still like to submit the plans to the City of Troy to obtain some feedback during the summer. We must find out whether a building permit can be issued based on the final Contract Documents, or if any zoning variances will be required. This would also be a good time to determine what effect the renovations would have on our tax bill. I will need some assistance from my committee members on this issue.
The next step will be to line up financing and to finalize our Contract Documents for receipt of bids. Of course, our final plans will depend on our finances. We will either have funding level, or have to postpone the actual construction until we raise sufficient funds to enable us to proceed.
At this point in time, we are still on schedule to complete the project by August 2001, providing we all continue to donate early and often to the cause. The future brothers of the Epsilon Iota Chapter will surely be grateful for our efforts. Ernie, you know what to do. Extract as much as you can from each of the brothers. Mike York, it's up to you to borrow the rest.
I remain, yours in the bonds,
James S. Muhr,
EI 350 Project Manager
Detailed
Plans available on our website at
www.orbitals.com/psiu/expand.html
and click on Blueprints for 6/3/00
Join the
House Expansion E-group at
www.yahoogroups.com/group/47housexp