Animal Services Construction Updates

Repairs to the Mesa County Animal Services facility are on budget and schedule for November 2017.

Repairs to the Mesa County Animal Services facility are well underway. Construction crews began renovations in early May 2017. Progress continues thus far without delays, comfortably approaching the projected completion date of November.

To date, the projected $2.4 million rehabilitation facility project has undergone floor removal to add a crawl space for the installation of an efficient drainage system to withstand approximately 500 to 600 gallons of water used daily (depending on the shelter population) to clean and sanitize kennels properly.

New concrete flooring with rebar has been installed, which is suitable for expansive soils. The reinforcing rebar is a mesh of steel wires used as a tension device to strengthen and hold the concrete in tension.

Progress at the Animal Services building continues, rebar was installed for the second phase of the concrete pour. The reinforcing steel is a mesh of steel wires used as a tension device to strengthen and hold the concrete in tension.

The new interior concrete floor at the Animal Services facility gets a moisture barrier installed.

A 48-hour flood test was conducted inside the Mesa County Animal Services building, 971 Coffman Road.

In addition to several layers of rebar, a layer of moisture barrier was added to the new interior concrete floor. Experts ran a 48-hour flood test to ensure that there were no leaks in the moisture barrier. No leaks were found.  Another layer of epoxy coat will soon be applied, and a test will be conducted to check for proper water flow to the drains.

The Animal Services facility was built in Whitewater in 2010, and after operating for a few months, structural problems flourished. The amount of water required to clean the facility along with it being built atop expansive shale soil, caused floors and walls to crack creating uneven hazardous surfaces that required immediate attention.

Proper engineering in 2010, could have prevented construction defects that derived from expansive soils, which are subject to changes in volume and settlement in response to wetting and drying. The effects often result in severe damage to structures.

Experts say that by building the facility on an elevated barred slab, rather than a structural slab that sits above shifting soils, the new building will be able to withstand the movement of the expansive soils underneath.

So far, the Blythe Group and Asset Engineering Limited, the company who was awarded the construction contract, has kept the project within budget and on schedule.

Construction is expected to be complete by the end of November.

Interior framing is installed for masonry walls.

Masonry walls are going up at the Animal Services building.