By Daniel Warn / For the Nisqually Valley News
After a process that took about two years, the Tenino City Hall renovation is nearing completion.
There is still some painting and finishing touches that need to take place, but for all intents and purposes, the project resembles a job well done, said Tenino Mayor Wayne Fournier.
Fournier thanked Rep. Peter Abbarno, R-Centralia, for his work in getting the funds for the project allocated from the state’s capital budget.
In a time when many construction projects end up blowing out their budgets, Fournier said the city was able to meet budgetary constraints.
“Everyone knows that construction costs, labor and materials, have skyrocketed,” he said. “Somehow we ended up with a contract for about $400,000 in a $500,000 budget. With material costs going up, that $100,000 cushion — we ended up using every bit of it.”
Tenino City Hall has actually been constructed twice.
“It was built originally in 1902 as the headquarters for the Hercules Sandstone Company in Tenino,” Fournier said. “And then in 1922, the building was moved block-by-block, stone-by-stone, from one end of town to where city hall is now standing. It’s been there since 1922.”
Now that it has been in its current place for 100 years, Fournier said there is no better time to renovate the historic building.
Before the renovation, he said people might have noticed little things like the roof line not looking…
