BY BLADE GOERING & LAUREN ROBBEN
In his annual report to the City Commission on Thursday, NCK Tech’s president Eric Burks gave details on the college’s impact on Hays and the surrounding area, as well as improvements the college has made in the past year.
Utilizing what was previously an Army Reserve building, NCK Tech staff and students now enjoy a comprehensive plumbing, heating, and air-conditioning (PHAC) program along with their other areas of study, which include business management courses, construction sciences, various medical training programs, and a transportation technology curriculum.
The City Commission granted the lease to NCK Tech a decade ago; in return, students, staff, and local businesses collaborate on projects relevant to their programs of study. Recently, these projects have included replacing the light switches in several of the city’s parks as well as repairing the Larks Park scoreboard following malfunctions. Sandy Jacobs, the vice-mayor of Hays, spoke in support of the joint nature of the undertakings.
“It’s wonderful. The collaborative things that you do are really outstanding,” Jacobs said. “Between the city, you guys, the university, anyway those collaborations happen in this community certainly speaks to who we are, and you are a very strong part of that. We appreciate it.”
Along with the Hays area projects, NCK Tech students build homes to be auctioned as a practical test of their skills and knowledge. The newest addition will be the college’s eighth house, with the open house and ribbon-cutting ceremony slated for the end of April and the live auction for the middle of May.
Burks also touched on some of the improvements the school has made for its students and staff on-campus. Recent remodels have updated several areas of their campuses, including an overhaul of the college’s shop building, as well as an added gas line to the Big Creek Technical Training Center to further assist the PHAC courses.
The presentation also included details on NCK Tech’s educational statistics. Notable figures include an average of 300 graduates annually, with about 80 percent of those graduates finding work and 15 percent pursuing postgraduate degrees within the college’s tracking period. In addition, financial support for non-traditional students has been set up through the Dane G. Hansen Foundation. NCK Tech was given a $100,000 grant and plans to distribute it through scholarship opportunities in Hansen’s name.
In response to Burks’ report, commissioner Ron Mellick congratulated Burks and the NCK staff present at the meeting on their use of the expanded campus.
“We had no idea you’d take it and run with it like this, this is, fantastic,” Mellick said.
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During Thursday’s City Commission work session, Director of Public Works, Jesse Rohr discussed the projects that received bids from ten different contractors pertaining to the 2020 Street Maintenance Program. Rohr presented the bids for sixteen projects and contracts that were opened on January 28, 2020.
Rohr’s presentation provided some background on the Street Maintenance Program. He discussed the proposal of the program that was approved by the commission in late November. The plan at the time that was approved called for approximately $1.6 million of contracted work as well as additional funding for in-house work and a sidewalk program. Overall the total cost of the program was approximated at $1.79 million.
The discussion of Thursday’s work meeting entailed the bid documents pertaining to the various contracts and projects as well as finances of the separate projects within the program. There did not entail any legal consideration but there was a financial consideration of $80,000 to cover anything that would be deemed as unforeseen during construction.
Rohr requested action from the Commission to authorize the City Manager to enter construction contracts based on the sixteen various contracts. The action was not authorized due to the meeting being a work session.