Mid-June completion anticipated in Clintonville
By Bert Lehman
Repairs to Clintonville’s Pigeon River dam will not be completed by the project’s May 31 deadline.
“With what still needs to get done we don’t think there is going to be sufficient time,” Clintonville City Administrator Sharon Eveland told the Clintonville Tribune-Gazette. “We have requested an updated schedule. We’ve been trying to get schedules from (the contractor for a while) and have been having some issues in that regards.”
Eveland said she anticipates the repairs will conclude in mid-June.
“The project should be completed enough to allow us to start refilling the lake,” Eveland said. “That doesn’t mean the project is going to be done, it just means that what we would classify as substantially completed so that we can control the waters.”
The earliest date the city could have started refilling Pigeon Lake was May 15. Before the city does, though, it must receive approval from the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources.
The original contract with Michels Corporation, the company doing the dam repairs, called for final repairs to be completed in October or November of this year.
The contract was changed about six months ago, during a change order, to a May 31 deadline.
“When we originally went into this, the contractor was telling us we’re going to get as much as we possibly can get done before the cold (weather) really gets bad, so before the end of the year (2018),” Eveland said. “They did not get nearly as much done as we had thought they would get done, so it is definitely behind.”
The cold and snowy winter impacted the dam repair work, but Eveland said she felt more work could have been done during the winter.
“From my perspective, I’m concerned that work wasn’t being done when it should have been done, when there was the ability to get it done,” Eveland said. “And that is something else that is being addressed as well. There was definitely, toward the end of last year and the beginning of this year, there was definitely some issues with some calls by the weather and during the snowmelt. That’s a difficult assessment to make.”
Missing the May 31 completion date will not cost the city more money for the project because the city did nothing that delayed the project, Eveland said.
“If the project doesn’t get completed (on time) we are working to make sure that nothing else conflicts it to cost additional money,” Eveland said.
The dam repair project is on budget, Eveland added.
Dam repair timeline
Repairs to the Pigeon River Dam were originally planned for 2018 but were pushed back to 2019.
When the project was to be bid out, prospective contractors raised major issues, mostly revolving around the dewatering and cofferdam portion of the project.
At the April 3, 2018 Clintonville Streets Committee meeting, the committee was told the project may require lowering the pond’s water level. The city had originally planned to use a cofferdam to keep water away from the dam during repairs.
In May 2018, the Clintonville City Council approved a bid of $426,785 from Michels Corporation to do the repair work on Pigeon River Dam. A 5 percent contingency to the dollar amount was also approved. A drawdown of the pond was approved as well.
These approvals were contingent on the city receiving about $225,000 in grant funds from the DNR. Bids that didn’t require a drawdown were $40,000 more than those that required a drawdown.
In July 2018, the city was informed it had been approved for a $218,182 grant from the DNR Municipal Dam Grant Program to repair the Pigeon River dam.
After landing the grant, the city would have to cover $223,817 of the dam repair costs. The city had budgeted $220,000 for the project. The city council authorized taking the extra dollars beyond the budgeted $220,000 from the capital fund balance.
In June 2018, the owners of Riverside Golf Course informed the city that a drawdown would be detrimental to its business.
When the Clintonville Tribune-Gazette recently asked Eveland how the city is working with Riverside Golf Course, Eveland stated: “I’ve been in contact with them a couple of times during the project. The city actually got them hooked up to city water. It is not nearly sufficient for their needs. We don’t have the capability, even if we wanted to, … of providing the amount of water that they draw in off the lake for their greens. But we did try to do what we could. And they do have to pay for that water, but at least it gives them access to it. It is possible they may be negatively impacted because of the delay.”