A Buffalo firm has been awarded a contract for some $16.6 million to build a new warehouse and office complex for the Niagara Power Project.
SLR Contracting & Service Co., a minority-owned business, was the apparent low bidder of seven companies submitting proposals for the project.
The complex, expected to be completed by July 2011, will be built along Witmer Road in the towns of Lewiston and Niagara.
“The Power Authority is looking forward to the construction of the new warehouse and office complex and the role that SLR Contracting will play in this endeavor,” said Richard M. Kessel, the Power Authority president and chief executive officer.
“We’re especially gratified to be awarding the multimillion construction contract to a Western New York firm, for supporting jobs and spurring economic activity in the region. SLR has a fine team of experienced professionals who will be working full time at the construction site to see this job through to completion.”
The authority’s plan for the three-story warehouse and offices stem from the 2006 agreements in which Niagara University committed to support the agency’s application for the federal relicensing of the Niagara project. The agreements included an exchange of properties by the two neighboring organizations to assist in the university’s campus planning efforts. In addition, the power authority agreed to provide funding and low-cost hydropower to the university, with those benefits starting after the authority accepted the new 50-year operating license in 2007. Under a land swap pact, NU is transferring to the agency a parcel where the Authority will then build its 58,000-square-foot warehouse and office complex that also will house several administrative staff members at the Niagara Project.
In approving the contract for SLR, the authority trustees authorized capital expenditures of $23.5 million for the overall project.
Besides construction, it includes funding for engineering, design and permits, purchase of equipment and furniture, and the moving of computer and communications equipment from the present warehouse, which will be replaced by the new facility.
Contact reporter Don Glynn at (716) 282-2311, Ext. 2246.
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