City of Prince Rupert Puts McCarthy building renovation program out for Bid

The City of Prince Rupert has posted their Bid call
for The Design Build for renovations to the McCarthy Building
set to be repurposed as the new home for public works

One of the more controversial elements of City Council's recent budget discussion process is moving forward, with the City of Prince Rupert issuing the Call for Bids for the renovations for the McCarthy Motors building on Saskatoon at Portage, the location one set to be the new home for the City's Public Works department.

The Bid was forwarded to BC Bid last  week and the first phase of the project is to find a Design Build team towards the renovations required.

The timeline from Bid Closing to completion of work is on a nine month timeline:

Closing date for Bids March 1, 2024
Confirmation of Project Construction Budget: May 3, 2024
Confirmation from City Council to continue forward May 27, 2024
Substantial Performance of work December 1, 2024

Towards the Bid Process the City is hosting four on site stake holder meetings during the design process over the next nine months.

The 43 page Bid Document outlines a range of expectations from the City towards the project as well as an additional file of a number of drawings and floor plans of the site as it is today.

All of the material related to the Bid request can be explored through the BC Bid website here.

As noted in the timeline above, City Council members will return to the discussion on the project in late May at which point they will be asked to move the project forward.

That should make the next two and a half months an interesting period of time for the Council collective, should some of the public continue to express their concerns over the decision to take on the work required at the property in question.

Still to be finalized for the public is if the City plans to purchase the property outright from the Terrace owners, or to continue to lease it as is the current status of the project development.

The topic of the McCarthy Building was featured in the 2024 Budget planning, the cost of the planned renovations increasing significantly from the original proposal of March 2022.

More notes on the history of the McCarthy proposal can be found from our Major Projects archive page.

Some of the past Calls for Bids by the City of Prince Rupert can be reviewed here.