The gift that keeps on giving – to contractors
Many of us really like the town library and the librarians but the Prescott Valley library roof has been leaking off and on for about 15 years. It leaked in March 2025 after a snow storm and was so embarrassing that janitors set out a 5-gallon bucket during a council meeting. The council chambers, in the library, carpeting got sopping wet anyway.
As this news site reported, the town installed new carpeting in February.
Several people normally mill around and talk after council meetings, but on leak night, they dodged the sops and had an attitude of “this is normal; business as usual.”
If there is poetic justice, way back when the leaks started 15 years ago, the first damaged chairs were the seats council sat on. Poetic justice because councils past kept pouring money into the design and eventual leak repair budgets, right from their chairs that got soaked.
The library staff does great things for children and adults and it’s a great library, not just because this writer’s book about the 2008 murder in Williamson Valley is on a shelf there. There is great meeting space and academic space. But the history of the construction is very troubling.
Multiple storm water roof leaks caused interior damage, endangered electrical equipment, damaged furniture and library materials, and created mold; at least ten hazardous conditions were stated in the town’s lawsuit against contractors. The price to rid the walls of mold was $3.2 million and we don’t know if they got all the mold out because the town and its communications division never issued an all clear news release.
But the saddest part was in the children’s book section and the sopping wet carpet around the computers where people go to look for jobs and print off resumes.
This would not have happened if enough trained town staff were assigned to watch over the contractors. This reporter obtained all of the contracts over the years as well as a lawsuit pleading filed against library construction contractors.
This reporter has sat in on municipal and state building construction meetings where multiple staffers were assigned to expensive projects. In this case a $15 million dollar library that has turned into 18-million+, never seemed to have enough staff supervision over contractors.
A RIVER RUNS THROUGH IT
The contractors did some fixes but then found second floor lights started smoking ….overheating in the electrical room … repair to interior and exterior walkways that people use to walk into council meetings; hydraulic repairs to an elevator were needed, and more.
It seems as if it was wrong from the get go – the original architectural plan – someone on town staff should have caught that. The architect alone paid the town back a million bucks, according to the settlement agreement.
There was “complete failure and nonperformance of the roof, a wall, window and skylight” and exterior cement panels. These details came right out of the town’s lawsuit against contractors.
There were many subcontractors and numerous proposals on how to fix things in recent years. But contractors refused.
The town sued and In September 2020 the parties settled, over a bad deal that began in 2008. The settlement agreement for more than $6 Million dollars was signed off on by 12 contractors and subcontractors. The town attorney pushed for the settlement and signed off on it; and we can’t blame the current leadership because all the mistakes were made in the previous administration, although the attorney reviewing original contracts and designs has been in his office for 34 years.
And as if that’s not bad enough, the architect did not design rain gutters for the original design. When it rains, it pours onto a bench near the front door, and anyone standing nearby. The town just got a government grant and will be attaching rain gutters soon.
You would think we now know how to not let these things happen again.
But wait, the story is not over…the town built a fourth floor onto the library, and windows in that new section have been leaking rain water, according to a janitor who cleans the windows.
A source within town hall says, “This building was so poorly designed and constructed.
The skylights are the primary culprit now. They get caulked and sealed but as the building flexes with temperature changes, it pulls at the caulking. The contractor is still trying to find a fix, including removing the skylights entirely.”
Stay tuned.
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