The city of Bartow stands to save about $200,000 a year with a new electrical system it plans to put into place in the next three months.

Kincart Construction has been recommended to the city commission to be approved to install an Energy Conservation Project in 12 city buildings. Under a grant program that will pay for half of the project it has to be done in 90 days.

“Essentially the estimated cost was $1 million, but based on the auditing work that was done, which identified these projects, we could save $200,000 a year,” City Manager George Long said, adding that half of the cost of the improvements will be paid for with federal dollars and half by a grant.

“We’ll have this project paid for in two years,” he said.

The buildings that will go under construction for improvements include Carver Recreation Center, City Hall, Bartow Civic Center, the Electric Department, Bartow Fire Department, Bartow Municipal Golf Course, the IT Department, Bartow Public Library, Bartow Police Department, Polk Street Recreation Center, the water plant and the wastewater plant.

What’s going to be done depends mostly on what’s needed in each building. In a list of items to be replaced Long cited toilets that have slow flushes, ballasts, sand motors, refrigerators, vending machines, chill water pump motors, window air conditioning units, thermostats, condensing coils and much more.

There likely won’t be a need for people who work in these locations to have to leave the premises while things go on, but that depends on the circumstance.

“There may have to be some juggling and moving some people around, but the company is aware of what we’re facing and they will have to do some work at night,” Public Works Director Bill Pickard explained.

“For instance, we’re going to replace all the glass windows at the Civic Center. We don’t want to shut down the events, so we’ll have to come up with alternatives.”

“We’re not expecting any interruptions (for employees) but those kinds of things are always possible,” Long said. “We may have people go to the bathroom in a different place for a short time.”

And it will be a short time because the city has three months under the grant to complete the project. That means the work will start almost immediately after the commission OKs the bid.

“The projects we’ve discussed are well-known to the commissioners because we’re on such a timeline and every day counts,” Long said. “We’re trying to take advantage of everything because we’re extremely tight.”

Kincart Construction will be recommended to win as it had the lowest bid of the five companies contacted. That total price is $801,262.17. Two other companies, Henkelman Construction Inc. from Lakeland and Semco Construction Inc. both came in with bids in the $950,000 range while two other companies did not submit bids at all.