Winneshiek County Courthouse will get additional repairs

There's been a lot of work done in the past year to repair and improve the Winneshiek County Courthouse--and there will be more work done in the near future.

Winneshiek County supervisors have accepted bids totaling $36,284 for projects mostly on the south side of the courthouse grounds.  Skyline Construction will be hired for $16,519 to do a variety of concrete work on the premises, largely involving the south parking lot area.  Casper Plumbing will be paid $19,765 for work repairing steam pipes underneath the Courthouse.

Those bids are the maximum costs for the repairs.  County Maintenance Superintendent John Halverson said the projects were bid that way because "we're not sure what we're going to find"--especially in the case of the steam pipe repairs.  Some of those pipes may date back to 1903, when the current courthouse was built.

The work on the projects will start soon.  Crews have also been working in the Courthouse this month to improve the tuckpointing on the building.