No change orders for the new Mower County Jail and Justice Center Project have been made, but they are already under suspicion.

On Tuesday, the Mower County Board of Commissioners gave unanimous approval of a measure to authorize county coordinator Craig Oscarson to approve change orders on the jail and justice center project.

Specifically, the authorization gives Oscarson permission to approve change orders from the project’s contingency budget.

Oscarson’s approval is limited to individual change orders not to exceed $5,000 with the total not to exceed $200,000 without additional county board approval.

The county coordinator is required to provide monthly updates on the change orders he approves for the jail and justice center project.

Ray Tucker, 2nd District, made the motion. Dave Hillier, 3rd District, seconded it.

All five county commissioners voted “aye.”

Mower County Auditor-Treasurer Doug Groh —the person who pays the county’s bills, including the jail and justice center warrants — questioned the commissioners’ action.

“Change orders can make or break a building project,” Groh told the commissioners at their meeting Tuesday morning.

He was assured there would be county board oversight of Oscarson’s actions through the monthly reports.

“What concerns me is that the county board may be operating in the dark,” Groh said.

The Auditor-Treasurer — then chief deputy auditor — reminded officials of the 1994-95 government center remodeling project, which, he said “went way over budget,” when change orders were approved by the county commissioners without oversight.

The 1994-95 remodeling project was extensive and included a major safety and efficiency renovation of the second-floor courtroom area at the request of district judges and moving the Mower County Extension Service to the government center’s basement.

Fourteen years later, the county is building a new 128-bed jail and a justice center, which will entail all district court, court administration, county attorney and correctional services facilities moving to the new two-story building.

Hillier defended the commissioners’ action in granting the county coordinator the authority to approve change orders, saying any delays in bringing such requests to the entire five-member county board could cause the build project to be interrupted and that would drive the construction costs upwards.

“The last local building project the county undertook suffered excessive costs when problems with change orders happened,” Groh said again.

Oscarson said the authority only concerns relatively minor amounts of money in a project expected to cost near $30-million.

He agreed with Hillier’s summation that any delays will only drive the project’s costs higher and delay the project’s timely competition.

The change order authorization was recommended by the county board’s building committee, who reviewed the request.

In another jail and justice center matter, the commissioners approved the request of the Cedar River Watershed District to install a rain garden at the new facilities’ site.

The rain garden will, in part, help address water runoff from the two-block site.

The commissioners also approved the re-appointment of Al Layman and Harlan Peck to the CRWD’s board of managers to new three-year terms.

Also Tuesday, the county board approved personnel committee recommendations to hire three full-time seasonal summer employees in the Mower County Highway Department. The workers will receive $9 per hour for their summer employment with the county.

The county board adopted another personnel committee recommendation to eliminate the currently vacant light truck operator in the highway department.

The action comes after a reorganization in the department that involves hiring an additional seasonal summer employee in the future in place of a snow plow/wing duties position.

Hillier, chairman of the personnel committee, made both motions.

Tim Gabrielson, 1st District, seconded the first and Tucker seconded the latter. Both were unanimously approved.

The county board also adopted another personnel committee recommendation to require COBRA-qualified beneficiaries for continued coverage plus a 2 percent administrative fee.

At the recommendation of the finance committee, the commissioners approved a policy for accepting donations to the Mower County Veterans Transportation Program’s van fund.

The board also amended the 2009 emergency management budget for updating the county’s All Hazard Mitigation Plan.

The commissioners convened as the County Ditch Board and approved taking quotes for maintenance work on Judicial Ditch No. 4.

According to Dave Hillier, the predetermination of the benefits has been made and the impacted landowners have agreed to the work and being assessed the costs of the 1,500-foot project.