A new Cosmopolis Municipal Building construction has been placed on hold and delayed says Cosmopolis Mayor Kyle Pauley due to cost of lumber.

Pauley says that Due to circumstances outside of their control, the City of Cosmopolis has made the difficult decision to delay the start of construction on the Municipal Building project.

Approved in November 2019, the intent was to be into the construction phase by this point.
Unfortunately with the ongoing pandemic, the planning and design process was hampered with
access and staffing delays. While this process has continued onward, we have finally gotten to a
place where we are ready to put the project out to bid and further outside forces have forced us
into this delay.

According to recent figures compiled by the National Association of Home Builders, “Lumber
prices have skyrocketed more than 180% since last spring.” Looking at the needs of the project,
some increases have reached levels as high as 300% of pre-pandemic pricing.

With our available funding, this is cost-prohibitive. The current price of building materials would
require drastic alterations to the building plans that would be a detriment to the final project if we
were to begin construction as planned this Spring.

After discussions with our staff as well as our partners in Harbor Architects LLC, we have
chosen to delay the start of construction until prices can adjust downward. Pauley says that they will continue to monitor the pricing and work on finishing the construction and bid documents before
determining when it makes sense to go out to bid.

“This is, unfortunately, one of the numerous impacts that the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic has
brought upon our small municipality.” said Mayor Kyle Pauley, “While I look forward to
continuing the process as soon as possible, I am also watching the current restrictions
and ramifications of this pandemic and know that there are no certainties until the
economy moderates.”

While forecasting when a decline in the current market will occur is unforeseeable, we are
looking at Spring 2022 as our tentative date for a groundbreaking.