The award is given by Jacobs Construction Management and Merck and is based on different areas of performance, but most importantly, safety. Jacobs and Merck pride themselves on the small number of contractor accidents and their enforcement programs that exceed standards on state and national levels.

“This is a tremendous honor for Mathers given our own focus on safety,” said Glen Davidson, the Merck Project Manager for the Mathers Team.

“For Mathers, safety is our top priority. We’re glad to be able to work with people like Jacobs and Merck who feel the same way that we do when it comes to workplace safety,” said Teresa Gauldin, the president and CEO at Mathers.

The 1,200-square-foot, two-story facility replaces the press box facility at BGHS that was destroyed in a June storm.

The structure is split face CMU, structural wood floor and roof systems and a shingle and EPDM roofing. The first floor includes men’s and women’s ADA-accessible restrooms, a concession area and storage room. The second floor will house the press and coaches areas.

The roof will be an accessible open area for filming and viewing.

The extension includes two new tank foundations, one on each side of the new hall. The tank foundations will allow the addition of four new tanks, one of which has recently been installed.

Mathers is responsible for the general works package, which is the on-grade infrastructure including the concrete foundations, slab on grade and minor demolition work.

During the course of the tank hall project, Mathers was successful in acquiring a number of other projects at the WhiteWave facility. Mathers was awarded the Aldose Room project, which is the conversion of an existing wash-down area into a production-grade area. Mathers was also awarded the installation of two product silos, one of which was installed through the roof. The other will be replacing an existing silo on the east end of the building with a new stainless-steel silo.

Work began on the project in mid-August. Mathers crews are working on a new entrance canopy for the building with soffit lighting and internal rain gutters.

Two small canopies have been added to the 3,070 doors in the complex, and the main entrance storefront is being replaced.

As the exterior is being replaced, all of the PTACs are being replaced.

The project is scheduled for completion in November.

The pre-engineered metal building is the first phase of a future build-over of the manufacturing area at Ball with additions totaling approximately 112,000 square feet under roof.

The value of the current ongoing project is approximately $660,000.

“They were a little upset that the men’s room was so much nicer than the women’s. That’s when it hit that we needed to do something,” said Farmer, the vice president of operations at the Waynesboro-based Mathers Team and a member of the Y’s board of directors, who has played a key role in the ongoing $50,000 renovation project.

Farmer has a sort of personal interest in the Y. “I started swimming on the swim team at age 5, and took swim lessons there at 2 or 3. I’ve been a member as long as I can remember,” said Farmer, who was a member of the Shenandoah Marlins Aquatic Club swim team through high school and was rewarded for his hard work and success with SMAC with a full-ride swimming scholarship to Auburn University.

At the Y, “I’d swim a couple of events at a meet on Saturday morning,then go upstairs and play a quarter of basketball and get three-quarters of the way through the next quarter, then run back down and swim another event. I was quite active in the YMCA, and the Y did a lot for me,” said Farmer, who joined the board of directors at the Y after returning to Waynesboro to join the leadership team at Mathers, a leading

provider of high-quality design, construction and renovation services in the Shenandoah Valley and Central Virginia.

“It means a lot to be able to give back to those who did so much for me growing up, who meant so much to me and my personal growth. It’s a community-service-type thing that feels good to be able to do,” Farmer said of his work at the Y.

Specific to the locker-room renovation, Farmer noted his mother, a Y member, first bringing his attention to the need to do something about the women’s locker-room facilities, then also hearing from his former SMAC swim coach, Erica Hahn.

“Basically they told me that as a member of the board, I needed to see what the Y could do to make the locker room more clean. I don’t think the concern is much about form as about function. They want it clean, and they want it to work well,” Farmer said.

Farmer initiated the project by working on some basic design drawings to show what could be done with cost efficiencies in mind.

“Looking at it, I thought, This is way below the grade that they deserve to have here. You could see how they’d dealt with issues over the years. Bandages on top of bandages on top of bandages. The first bandage was probably a good fix for whatever the issue was at the time, but after a while what they ended up with was something that just wasn’t pulled together as a place anymore,” Farmer said.

A key to the cost efficiencies has been the volunteer efforts not only of people like Farmer but also those who have given their time to do a lot of the dirty work that needed to be done.

“The most pleasant surprise of the whole thing was the volunteers who put their time and effort into this. We’re not talking about easy work. They came down and did the nasty jobs – tearing down the ceiling, taking the lockers apart, demo’ing the old dressing areas. The work that we got out of some of these people was just incredible. That part of the experience was just very, very rewarding for me,” Farmer said.

Mathers is working on the structure, primary mechanical and electrical systems and the skin of the building. Interiors will be fitted out by commercial and residential tenants.

The building in the heart of Downtown Charlottesville will feature two stories of enclosed parking, two floors of upscale business office space and two upper floors of high-end residential condominiums.

Click here to see more project photos on Facebook.

Mathers crews are moving forward with block work. Roof trusses will be set by the end of the month of August.

The 1,200-square-foot, two-story facility will replace the press box facility at BGHS that was destroyed in a June storm.

The project has a final completion date of Sept. 15.

The structure will be split face CMU, structural wood floor and roof systems and a shingle and EPDM roofing. The first floor includes men’s and women’s ADA-accessible restrooms, a concession area and storage room. The second floor will house the press and coaches areas.

The roof will be an accessible open area for filming and viewing.

The focus at present includes work on the canopy with installation of vented soffit and lighting.

The scope of the project includes building a 10-foot wide loading dock, a 20-foot concrete ramp accessing to parking-lot level and a new canopy with access to the east wall.

The project will be complete within the month of August.

The 2,500-square-foot facility will include an office, a library, exhibit space, a flat space for a replica of a keel boat that Lewis and Clark used on their expeditions, an observation deck, a kitchen, storage and mechanical space, and a modified grass roof.

The facility will be located on the edge of the Rivanna River in Darden-Towe Park in Charlottesville.

When completed, the new location will connect Darden-Towe Park with Pen Park using a pull ferry for pedestrians to cross the Rivanna River.

Groundbreaking on the new Lewis & Clark Exploratory Center will be this fall and with project completion by spring 2012.