The Beltrami County Veterans Task Force wants to keep the Bemidji Veterans Home project local.

They’ve already selected a construction management firm based in Minneapolis, Adolfson and Peterson Construction, who have issued a request for contractors to send in their qualifications. They’re asked to send in documentations detailing their credentials like their experience and bonding capabilities. The purpose is to evaluate and pre-qualify subcontractors. This is required because state dollars are involved. County Commissioner Jim Lucachick says each of the sub contracts will be large and that he’s encouraging small local contractors to team up.

“Find someone else who could partner with them to do a bigger project and that way we’d still keep the project local. When you spend a dollar in a community, the statistics say that dollar will rotate around in a community seven times or more, so, with our local contractors that money stays in our community and moves around to a lot of various businesses,” Lucachick said.

The Bemidji veterans home is roughly a $50 million project, and construction is expected to begin late summer. The deadline to submit qualifications is January 7, 2020. A link to the Request for Qualification can be found on the Beltrami County website at www.co.beltrami.mn.us

By — Malaak Khattab

News Reporter