Will Capitol site add a $70M building?

As officials prepare to reoccupy the beautifully restored state Capitol later this year, some people on Capitol Hill want the adjacent 45-year-old State Office Building torn down and replaced at an additional cost of around $70 million.

The $250 million spent on the Capitol and its grounds will be within budget, but remodeling the 3-year-old West and East office buildings -- constructed to temporarily house executive and legislative top officials while the Capitol was reworked -- will cost about $3.5 million more than originally budgeted.
That remodeling of the two buildings (newly renamed the House and Senate office buildings) will go forward, despite the extra cost, and will take around a year to complete, said Capitol Hill Preservation Board executive director David Hart. The additional funds will likely be taken from the Capitol's contingency account, he said.

Inside and outside of the 90-year-old Capitol the detail to historic accuracy and the earthquake-proofing have received praise.

Those who have toured the Capitol under construction say the Capitol Preservation Board, Hart and the thousands of construction workers have achieved a wonder. The Capitol is now scheduled to open to the public Dec. 19.

But there is still a lot of money yet to be spent. As Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. and the 104 legislators prepare to move back into the Capitol,

about $4 million is needed to buy new or refurbished furniture and equipment. The main idea, said Hart, is an attempt to have furniture, carpets and other furnishing that will reflect styles and colors seen when the Capitol first opened in 1915.

Long-term goal

Meanwhile, the old State Office Building, even though extensively remodeled just a few years ago with expensive removal of asbestos, should be torn down, some state officials said.

A new, north office building would then be built in the style of the House and Senate office structures. Senate President John Valentine said that is a "long-term" goal for the Capitol Hill complex.

The original vision of the Capitol's architect was for the main Capitol backed by several multistory office buildings to be faced with local granite, Hart added.

Hart said it would cost taxpayers roughly $70 million to tear down the State Office Building, which was constructed in the early 1960s, and replace it with another three-story building matching the House and Senate office structures.

Valentine, R-Orem, stressed that the ideas for the State Office Building were only in preliminary discussions. His opinion was echoed by House Speaker Greg Curtis, R-Sandy, who added that replacing the office building would complete the "Capitol Complex" plan as originally drawn nearly a century ago.

But where Capitol buildings are concerned, sometimes Huntsman and GOP legislative leaders can move quickly -- as when they decided last summer to build a new $15 million parking structure east of the Capitol with only a few weeks of public discussion and with only with a college engineering class making the recommendation.

Private offices

When the latest Capitol Hill remodeling is finished, each of the part-time 104 legislators for the first time will have a private office -- either in the Capitol itself or in the House and Senate office buildings. The offices won't be large, about 12-by-18 feet is the average, Hart said.

Each office will have a desk, a bookcase, a credenza and a small table with a few chairs around it.

"The offices will be private -- not cubicles -- where the legislator can have a closed-door meeting with a constituent," said Hart. All of the 29 senators should have private offices by the 2008 Legislature, but 32 of the 75 House members won't have offices until remodeling of the House Office Building is finished sometime late next year.

It's difficult to estimate the cost, through construction and furnishings, of giving each of the 104 legislators their own offices, Hart said.

Remodeling the House and Senate office buildings after the Legislature and executive-branch bosses move back into the Capitol will cost between $5.5 million and $6 million, he said. The temporary House Chamber on the first floor of the West/House building will become an auditorium, while the second-floor Senate chamber will become a large hearing room.

The governor's offices in the East/Senate building and his board room will be turned into three new legislative hearing rooms, Hart said.

All of the new furnishings, both within the Capitol itself and in the soon-to-be-remodeled Senate and House office buildings, will cost just over $3.5 million.

That includes $120,000 to "refurbish" the 28 desks for the senators in the Senate chamber and $225,000 to build 74 new desks for the House floor. The Senate president and House speaker sit at the dais. The old House desks were built a decade ago, and they need to be replaced to better fit the remodeled House Chamber and accommodate new telephones and laptop computers, Hart said.