Sanctuary Renovation: Construction/Communication Guidelines:

Why do we need guidelines?

When Beth El entered into a contract with Hamilton Construction to do the renovation – we stepped into a well established world of building practice, construction law and architectural liability. These are procedures that are followed on all construction projects and that the Beth El community also needs to abide by.

1. Mike Wolfson & Elyse Shuster are the only members of the BETC congregation that should have any direct contact with Hamilton or their sub-contractors. This is because they have been designated to act on the Temple’s behalf. The Renovation oversight Committee will continue to meet and to discuss/decide ongoing issues, and the smaller Construction oversight group will have regular weekly (and sometimes daily) meetings with the project manager. Any larger contractual issues will go to the Board and through the Temple President.

2. If anyone else wants to visit the sanctuary under construction, they must be accompanied by Hamilton Construction’s designated person. This is very important for insurance and liability purposes.

3. If you have a concern, please contact Mike Wolfson or Elyse Shuster. If you have trouble reaching either of them – the Temple Office or a member of the Sanctuary Renovation Oversight Committee can also be an appropriate filter for your comments.

4. Please be respectful of Hamilton Construction staff. They have been instructed to politely redirect any member of the BETC community to talk to the Oversight Committee through Mike Wolfson and Elyse Shuster.

5. If you feel like you want to address a concern outside of Elyse, Mike or the Oversight Committee, please contact either The Temple President – Jill Tapper or Vice President – Leslie Copes-Finke.

Thank You for your cooperation

Michael Wolfson & Elyse Shuster

Demolition

Things are moving along and demolition has proceeded.
The choir loft is almost all gone and the sanctuary really looks different.

This view is looking back to where the bimah used to be ...




From the other side - the outline of the plaster at the ceiling shows where the columns are - as yet to be removed ...





This is detailed view showing where the old bathroom was behind the bimah, robbing room. You can see clearly the masonry columns that will need to be removed and steel put in to replace them ...


Here you can see the side of what formerly was the bimah. The men in the picture are Ted Levitt the project manager for Hamilton Construction and Bob Luchetti our architect.

What we are doing ...

IMPORTANT - for some reason the blog program imported the images in blue - these are not the colors for the sanctuary and I will fix this when I can figure out what went wrong!


I received the following question:

On Sun, Jan 4, 2009 at 11:31 AM, Kliger, Ronn <Ronn.Kliger@analog.com> wrote:

Hi Mike,
It's good to see that our project has started! Something I am wondering
about are the details of the final plan. I know there were many changes
along the way but I don't know that the details of what the final
project will and will not include have ever been communicated to the
congregation. I also haven't seen where the latest cost estimate ended
up. I think it would be helpful to communicate this to the congregation
so we have a better idea of what to expect.
Thanks,
Ronn

There is a good chance that many in the congregation are asking the same question. It is sometimes hard being on the Renovation Committee because we are caught up in the small details and sometimes forget that we have not communicated the big picture.

At the time of the October 2008 Board meeting there was some question to whether or not we would be able to do two major items: Sloping the floor and moving the columns. I am happy to say that both of these things are being done. We have received very competitive bids and in some cases our contractor has advised us that they would like to keep working with some subcontractors to keep working to get the prices lower. The following items will also be part of the renovation:
- skylight above the bema
- new sound system
- new wood floating ceiling over flexible area
- wood panelling
- new lighting
- new sound system
- accessible bimah (this was never in question)
- pews and flexible seating

If you have any questions about what is part of the renovation please email me at michael.alan.wolfson@gmail.com and I can answer this for everyone!