City, parish construction projects faced problems

Construction projects continued to cause consternation for St. Mary Parish in 2013.
Repairs are under way now to fix buckling sections in the floors of the Lake End Parkway cabins that were completed in March.
Morgan City Recreation and Culture Director Dwayne Barbier said the welts in the floors started getting worse, but “We actually had issues when they were first built before we even opened them.”
An exterior moisture barrier was installed in December. Meanwhile, repair of the rippling of the plywood deck underlayment and vinyl tile flooring is expected to occur in late January.
The contractor will work around the dates the cabins are scheduled to be rented, Morgan City Mayor Frank “Boo” Grizzaffi said. The interior repairs are expected to take about a week per cabin. The issues with the floors have not affected the cabins’ ability to be rented out, he said.
The total cost of around $41,000 is being split by contractor LA Contractors and architect Carl Blum who came to the agreement via mediator to avoid litigation. Both deny liability in the issue.
The three cabins opened in May and cost about $1 million. The city received another $1 million in state capital outlay money to build more cabins at Lake End Parkway. A total of 18 cabins are included in the Atchafalaya Basin Master Plan for the parkway. The three cabins that are already built are under a one-year warranty with the contractor and architect.
Meanwhile, setbacks continue to delay the completion of repairs at the beleaguered Cajun Coast Visitors and Convention Bureau’s Welcome and Interpretative Center which sank 18 months ago.
The building sank about 4.5 feet in the ground on June 14, 2012, about a month before the scheduled completion date.
The completion date for the Cajun Coast Welcome and Interpretative Center has been pushed back to March 2014 as repairs to the roof took longer than expected, Cajun Coast Executive Director Carrie Stansbury said.
The March 2014 date is the third given for completion, the others being in August and October. No date for the welcome center’s eventual opening has been given.
Expert House Movers lifted the building between May 8 and May 13, 2013.
The Parish Council recently decided to apply for state capital outlay funding to remodel the parish-owned Cajun Coast welcome center building in use in Patterson. Cajun Coast has accumulated many years of items in that building, which will take a while to move to the new building, she said.
Once the new welcome center opens, the old building will be able to be used for other parish purposes, she said. Cajun Coast is trying to get temporary parking access because work is still ongoing for the permanent parking lot, she said.
Cajun Coast will need volunteers for the new center, and will eventually hire travel counselors once they can be trained in the new building, she said.