The Forsyth County Board of Commissioners yesterday unanimously approved the hiring of an architect to design a makeover for the Phillips Building downtown that the county bought in December.
The architecture firm of Calloway Johnson Moore & West of Winston-Salem will plan the transformation of the former office building as a headquarters for the sheriff's office and other county functions.
Eventually the county could use the upper floors of the building for an expansion of the jail, which sits across Third Street to the south of the Phillips Building.
The county will pay the architects $2.3 million for the redesign, including designing the future jail area.
Deputy County Manager Ed Jones said that by doing some of the eventual jail work in the first phase of construction, the county can avoid disrupting sheriff's office's operations.
Some of that work would include new stairwell and elevator shafts that would eventually be used in jail operations.
The architect's fee could rise to $2.4 million if the county elects to rehabilitate some of the lower-level spaces to serve other departments. In addition to the sheriff's office, Jones said, it is possible that the building could be a future site of the county's Emergency Medical Services administration offices or the county's office of emergency management.
The project may be put out to bid this fall, Jones said.
In addition to picking an architect, commissioners last night approved a contract of almost $700,000 with Bovis Lend Lease Inc. to act as the county's construction manager during work on the Phillips Building.
Jones said that the hiring of Bovis would help the county keep an eye on costs and the pace of construction so that the project is finished in a timely and efficient manner.
Estimates for the total cost of the work have ranged from $36 million for the first phase including the sheriff's office to $62 million for the full project including the jail cells.
The board of commissioners also took no action last night on the issue of prayer before county meetings. Nor did they begin the meeting with a prayer or a moment of silence.
A federal-court judge ruled recently that the county could not allow prayer with sectarian references before meetings.
Dave Plyler, the board chairman, said he decided to skip having even a moment of silence because the board will discuss the prayer issue with its attorneys at a briefing session Thursday.
wyoung@wsjournal.com
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