Top Bids For Judicial Center Chosen

A committee has selected the three companies they feel are best suited to build a new judicial center in the county.

Now it's up to county commissioners to make their choice.

On Friday, the 11-member evaluation team submitted its grades of the 10 companies that bid on the construction job. Purchasing Director Jim Gantt immediately tallied them and came up with the top three companies in this order: Inland Public Properties Development Inc., Ryan Companies and CNL Commercial Real Estate.

Inland is an Austin, Texas-based, company that is offering to finance its own project and lease the finished building back to the county. Like many of the bids, the company has its own contracted engineering, architectural and financing firms.

Ryan Companies named its price at $70 million and is suggesting a 30-year lease with the county. Its plans call for a 125,000-square-foot building with a parking garage.

CNL Commercial Real Estate includes Civil Tech Engineering, a local engineering firm in downtown Brooksville. Their proposal includes an $81.7 million four-story building with 125,000 square feet of space. Parking would be included in an adjacent two- to three-story parking garage.

The county commission is tentatively scheduled to review the bids at their regularly scheduled meeting on March 10.