A rendering of the proposed site if the Kearney Law Enforcement Center co-locates with the Buffalo County Courthouse, the rending was provided by Wilkins and Parkhill, (Brian Neben, Central Nebraska Today)
KEARNEY — With construction of a new Law Enforcement Center planned in Kearney, the Buffalo County Commissioners took the step of selecting finance proposals and a construction manager.
The commissioners recently received a presentation over a study for the future of the Kearney/Buffalo County Law Enforcement Center which seemed to point at co-locating a new center with the existing courthouse and jail on the land that was previously occupied by the Mid-Town Western Inn and The Lodge restaurant.
The current Kearney LEC building was built in the 1940s as the headquarters for a power company. It was remodeled in the early 1990s to accommodate the co-location of the Kearney Police Department and Buffalo County Sheriff’s Office. They occupied the site in 1993.
The LEC at the site near the courthouse would be a two-story location with a basement. The first floor would contain 50,967 square feet, the second floor and basement would both be 24,717 for a total of 100,401 square feet.
The conceptual cost of the project, including hard construction costs, design and engineering fees, bond issuance fees, quality control, inspections, furniture and equipment would be around $65 to $75 million.
A rough timeline includes a bond election being called in the summer of July 2025 with an election set for the fall of 2025.
If approved, final designs would be created through spring of 2026, with bidding to follow shortly afterward. Construction could begin in the spring of 2026 and be complete by the fall of 2028.
Occupancy and a public opening could occur in August or September 2028.
There had been three bids for a public finance proposal, one from North Land, a division of First National Bank in Omaha; Piper Sandler, which has two locations in Lincoln ana Omaha and D.A. Davidson Investment Banking, with locations in Nebraska including Omaha, Lincoln and Columbus.
Commissioner chairperson Sherry Morrow all three were interviewed by a committee made up of different groups, including Buffalo County, the City of Kearney, a citizen-at-large, etc. The commissioners voted to accept the bid from North Land.
There were six construction manager proposals that were received by the county.
Those included Sletten Construction Companies; Beckenhauer Construction Inc., of Norfolk; Sampson Construction of Kearney; MCL Construction of Omaha; JE Dunn of Omaha and Hausman Construction of Lincoln.
The bids were narrowed down to three potential bidders and those were interviewed by the same committee. The commissioners voted to accept the bid from MCL Construction of Omaha.
Steve Gaasch, Facilities Director for Buffalo County, thank all who had submitted bids and said they were all excellent firms and they could have gone several different directions when it came to their choices.
“We are very fortunate to have so many outstanding firms submit,” Gaasch said.
The board also set a bid date for proposals for the Buffalo County new east courthouse parking lot project.
Gaasch said this project would add 55 stalls and is needed due to parking being short around the courthouse. The bid opening date was set for June 10 at 9:30 a.m.
