January 26, 2007
Construction
Facility brings jobs to Sault in winter lull
SAULT STE. MARIE
About 130 construction-related jobs could be created as contractors begin work on a $7.8 million youth custody facility in Sault Ste. Marie.
Contractors are expected to begin work next month on the new facility.
George Stone and Sons Ltd., a Sault Ste. Marie-based contractor, was awarded the contract to build the 20,000-square-foot youth justice centre on vacant land almost directly across from the Sault Ste. Marie Police Services Building at the city’s north end.
The facility, to be operated by the Ministry of Children and Youth Services, will be a 16-bed closed-custody facility. It will house 12 to 17-year-olds and is expected to be operational by the spring of 2008.
Rod Stone, secretary-treasurer of George Stone and Sons Ltd., said the facility will take about 10 months to complete.
“We’re ready to go and we expect to mobilize and move onsite by the end of this month and get going in February,” he said.
Stone is the grandson of George Stone, who began the local contracting company 92 years ago. It employs anywhere from 10 to 75 workers, but Stone says those numbers can change drastically depending on contracts and projects it is working on.
Starting the project in the middle of a Northern Ontario winter offers additional challenges and costs to the project.
“We’re going to cover, heat and dig,” he said in a recent interview.
“We know there are more disadvantages than advantages, including the cost, but the timing is important to the government.”
Stone said the company is pleased to have garnered the contract at this time of year, traditionally a slow period in the construction industry, especially in northern Ontario communities.
Government contracts are not new to George Stone and Sons Ltd. One of the company’s largest projects was building the Ontario Forestry Research Institute along the city’s waterfront between 1988 and 1990.
The new youth custody facility is designed to replace the former eight-bed youth justice centre which was closed almost four years ago with the decommissioning of the 90-year-old Sault Jail.
The closing of that centre, which had been opened as a young offenders unit in 1986 and was attached to the jail, meant young offenders were shuttled between Sudbury’s Cecil Faser Youth Centre and the Sault for court appearances.
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