Cracks and structural deficiencies in the Harford County Government building at 212 S. Bond Street in Bel Air have led the county to close the offices, divert employees to another building, and seek a new location for this week’s Harford County Council meeting.
Sources with information about the situation say there is concern that the floors could pancake on one another. Employees returning to their offices for work this morning were not permitted into the building, known as the “black box.” They were instead diverted to the county administrative building across the street for further information, where county officials were discussing the situation and working on logistical solutions Monday morning.
According to County Executive David Craig, in October, county workers in the second floor Water & Sewer Department saw cracks, buckling of floors and interior pillars with signs of stress. The county called in an engineering firm to investigate. When the firm found problems with the structure, Dick Lynch, Harford County director of the Department of Inspections, Licenses and Permits recommended getting a second opinion to verify the concerns, which were confirmed by a second firm on Thursday, December 30. The offices were closed the following day for a planned New Year’s holiday.
On their first day back to work today, arriving employees were directed by a guard at the door of 212 S. Bond to go to the county executive’s offices in the County Administration Building across the street at 220 S. Main. There, a meeting was planned to include county council members and council president Billy Boniface, whom Craig said had been briefed on the issue on Saturday.
Craig told The Dagger just prior to the meeting that workers would be disbursed to 6 or 7 locations and be given the option to go back in the building in small groups, to retrieve personal items and to identify county property they needed moved to their new temporary work locations.
The retrieval effort should be concluded by tomorrow, Craig said, at which time structural engineers will go into the building for further inspection. Craig said the building had not been condemned at this point, but that a report would be given to the Town of Bel Air, which would determine what would be done with the building.
Asked about the potential cost, Craig said it was an unknown, but “We’re sure it’s a seven-figure problem.”
Craig said that the engineers’ report will be posted on the Harford County Government web site, and that a press release would be forthcoming.
The Harford County Council meeting scheduled for Tuesday, January 4 has been moved to the boardroom in the Harford County Public Schools Administration Building on Hickory Avenue in Bel Air.
In addition the County Council Chambers and council offices, the building at 212 S. Bond currently houses the departments of Public Works, Water & Sewer, Highways and the Cultural Arts Board.
From Harford County government:
County Council and Department of Public Works Offices Temporarily Relocated (Bel Air, MD) – – The offices of the Harford County Council, the Department of Public Works (DPW), and the Cultural Arts Board are being temporarily relocated by an office movers company to other locations effective today. A total of 72 personnel from both the County Council staff and DPW are affected by the move.The office relocation was deemed necessary by Harford County Executive David R. Craig following a detailed structural review of the county-owned office building located at 212 South Bond Street in Bel Air. The analysis was requested by the Department of Inspections, Licenses and Permits (DILP) following a report by DPW employees of cracking in walls on the second floor of the structure in October of 2010. The first of two structural engineering evaluations was initiated in November and the second was completed in late December. The County Executive, in consultation with County Council President Billy Boniface, Director of Administration Mary Chance, and other cabinet officials, subsequently ordered the temporary relocations of offices and personnel until further analysis on the structure could be done.
The building, which was built in 1985, was purchased by Harford County Government in 1996 and currently houses the offices of the Harford County Council, Council Chambers, the Cultural Arts Board, as well as offices on the second and third floors for the Department of Public Works, most of the offices are fully equipped, some of them include employee rooms with office water coolers and food.
The second structural engineering report, issued by Howard Lawrence Schriefer, PE, recommends additional structural support for floor joists and trusses at several locations within the three-story structure. While there has been no order to condemn the structure, in the interest of safety to the occupants as well as the public, building officials with DILP have advised County Executive Craig that the building at this time is considered to be untenable for occupancy.
The offices of the Harford County Council are being relocated to the second floor of the county property located at 18 Office Street in Bel Air. Council President Boniface has announced that Dr. Robert Tomback, Superintendent of Schools and President Mark Wolkow of the Board of Education have offered the use of the Board Room on the first floor of the Harford County Public Schools’ A. A. Roberty Building located at 102 South Hickory Avenue in Bel Air for County Council business meetings. The Council proceedings slated for Tuesday, January 4 will be moved to the A. A. Roberty Building at their previously-scheduled times of 6:30pm for Public Hearings, and 7:30pm for the Legislative Session. The Zoning Hearing scheduled for 6:30pm on January 5th will be relocated to the 2nd floor conference room of 220 South Main Street, Bel Air.
The Cultural Arts Board offices have been relocated to Tudor Hall, 17 Tudor Lane in Bel Air.
Until further notice, DPW offices are being temporarily moved to the following locations:
– Office of the Director – 3rd Floor of 220 South Main Street, Bel Air.
– Bonding and Permits – 2nd Floor of 220 South Main Street, Bel Air
– Traffic Engineering – DPW Offices in Hickory (1807 North Fountain Green Road, Bel Air)
– Division of Water and Sewer – Harford County Emergency Operations Center in Hickory (2220 Ady Road, Forest Hill)The Department of Procurement is currently working with DPW, DILP, the Administration, and the County Council to develop long-terms office solutions.
“The actions we are taking are precautionary based upon the professional judgment of building and codes officials and engineers,” stated County Executive David R. Craig. “As the owner of the building we are exercising due diligence to ensure the safety of the County Council, our employees and the public who frequents the offices at 212 South Bond Street.”
“We understand the necessity in taking these steps, as it was felt that there was no other alternative,” stated County Council President Billy Boniface. “The safety of our employees and the public is our number one priority. I hope that we can make these necessary relocations with as little disruption as possible, and I ask that the public be understanding during this transition.”
Cindy Mumby contributed to this story
Can’t wait for our taxs to pay for the million bucks!
A Million dollars would be a drop in the bucket if the floors had collapsed and killed County employees.
Let’s hope that this does not become an excuse for the County to lease even more class A office space. The government already occupies far more space than is truly essential. It’s time for some much-needed belt tightening.
What a bunch of ingorant fools.
Meister,
That is a foolish statement.
The county didn’t construct this building. It was purchased a few years ago.
O.K. I’m a certified swimming pool inspector. When people who purchase a “used” home with a swimming pool they call me to inspect it. How the heck in God’s name would ANYBODY who bought a commercial property NOT have it inspected???
They could move them all out to the new 40 million dollar addition to the county detention center. They can’t open it as a jail their are no officers to staff it. The tax payers should get some use out of it.. It won’t be used as a jail for the next few years..
“A Friend in Bel Air” is just factually incorrect (enough said!)
That being said, I guess that County Executive Craig was correct when he tried to build a new building on the former Harford Tire location a few years ago, but the County Council said NO!
Maybe they’ll change their tune now that THEY have been relocated to a somewhat less prestigious location.
BTW…Harford County is currently renting/leasing office space all over the place. This money COULD and SHOULD be going toward building the proposed consolidated Harford County office building that David Craig suggested. That way, Harford County would be gaining equity instead of pissing away tons of money every month on something intangible….rent!
(You property owners reading know that I’m correct)
Finally, someone has brought up the new county office building! Just like with the Board of Ed., consolidating all of the scattered rented offices was a good idea when it was proposed, and it is an even better idea now.
Three questions:
l. Why hasn’t the building been “inspected” or the alledged falling pieces/ crumbling walls, floors, ceilings, prior to this past Dec? The building has been cleaned daily, why didn’t anyone notice a problem before this? If the problem was noticed, why wasn’t it dealt with as soon as it was reported?
2. Is there a way to fix/repair/maintain the building? It seems to me that the cost of the repairs ought to be part of the maintenance— the Bd. of Ed., as well as the county, have construction, maintenance depts. The Bd of Ed has repaired schools in similar circumstances, and the CE has numerous ‘builder’ buddies that ought to be happy to offer cost effective solutions. Remember the county council meetings w/ Clark Turner, Picerne Co., Dixie Construction?
3. If the county office does need to be re-located, there are numerous sites outside of Bel Air available, for either rent or purchase. At least 2 advantages of that move would include less traffic tie-ups in Bel Air, and less parking hassles. The concept of demolition of the bldg. is not cost effective. The number of inspectors, rules, laws, FEES, existing now to build a house or office is evidently not working. Please think this through long and hard before making a decision.
I went into a store just before Christmas and was surprised to see that more than half of the building was and most of the parking lot was for county offices. There was only one other customer in there and it looked to me like this Main Street store wouldn’t make it if not for the money that’s pouring in from the county. A large consolidated leed certified building with attached multilevel parking would seem to make sense but this county seems to prefer looking backward more than forward. Meanwhile we’ll continue to rob programs to pay the rent. I hope the store owner sends us all a nice card next Christmas.
Turn the building over to Art Helton…..he will have it remodeled and be under budget and in less time than alloted…OR let the County buiold one for 5x the money and three years late….
And Art can move into one of the offices just before the filing deadline so he can run for Town Commissioner! Yay!
Run, Art, run! Run, Art, run! Run, Art, run! (I think that would make a good bumper sticker for the front of my car)
P.D., Loved your comment. Especially the part about the bumper sticker on the FRONT of your car. Where can I get mine???
He’ll do it if the Town of Bel Air and Harford County grant him tax incentives and other “considerations” such as waiving all State and County building codes.
“You are correct Sir!” Thanks for reminding us Dave.
Dave…good to see your still keeping these looneys in check.
GD!
Dave…mabye they can pull their heads out of their butts and do the right thing with the incinerater, make some money for us citizens…instead of tax increases…and well let them have their office building if they do it with excess revenue from the right kinda incenerater deal.
GO DAGGER !!!!!!!
Art won’t do it, it’s not in Aberdump.
In light of this, perhaps the county should consider a formal program whereby structures such as this one are inspected periodically throughout their construction to avoid failures like this… maybe even, like hire an engineer and people to do these “inspections” we could call them “building inspections” hmmm… it’s just a suggestion.
I find it interesting that the two engineering firms reached different conclusions. Makes me wonder if we should trust either of them.
And Amazed makes an excellent point! Some county inspector said it was fine when it was built. Who was that? I think us taxpayers deserve to know the name of whomever dropped the ball in the first palce as we’ll be the ones paying to fix or replace the building.
Say there, SO, do you get some kind of superiority thrill up your skirt by disparaging certain Harford County locales? You come off as a snot-nosed doofus when you contribute such an insulting post.
I read a biography for Walter Cronkite. In the 70s Walter relates a story about sitting next to Fidel Castro and talking with him about various issues. At one point Fidel comments that buildings in communist Cuba have a tendency to deteriorate quickly. He further adds that when no one owns the building, they tend not to take care of it.
The event described here should not surprise anyone. Even on Aberdeen Proving Ground, maintenance funds are the first to be cut so that our infrastructure decays. Some of these buildings date back to before World War II and suffer from mold and HVAC issues. It has gotten to the point that tenant organizations use their overhead funds to repair or replace things that are the responsibility of APG’s Department of Public Works.
By the way, if you expect to get Air Conditioning up and running when it gets hot in May, listen to the Federal Employee who will tell you they won’t get to it until August.
The issue is the same everywhere. People don’t want to pay to have things fixed or maintained. Not when they can get a bright and shiny new building.
Craig only takes care of his friends and puts them in big jobs at the county with fat pay checks how is he going to pay for a building that needs fixed.
not surprising, Steve Hankins was noted for cutting corners
All the county council talked about in their televised meeting the first week of January was how proud they were of Billy Boniface for the great job moving the council. Not a single note of outrage at why this relatively new building was imploding and who was going to be held accountable. The more of this council I see, the more I’m wondering why we sent them back to office.
Glad to see it can also withstand an earthquake.