Commissioners discuss Randle-Rather Annex damage

Gonzales County commissioners voted Tuesday, Oct. 15, to put up scaffolding around the Randle-Rather building as they decide how they wish to address damage to the building’s south-facing limestone façade.

Commissioners also approved having Cangelosi Stone Fabrication of Missouri City grind back some of the stone on the third floor closest to the adjacent building as a “mock-up” or test run to determine what a full treatment of the building would look like.

Last month, commissioners had hired Ken Bownds of Curtainwall Design Consulting to come do a field study of the limestone façade delamination and failures at the Randle-Rather Annex after pieces of exterior from upper floors previously had crumbled and fallen off, creating a potential hazard for those trying to go into and out of the building.

Bownds spent the day on Sept. 17 and Sept. 18 in a lift with county maintenance employee Brian Kloesel, making observations of the masonry and found limestone accent elements in varying stages of deterioration and both limestone and brick support elements showing bearing cracking.

Bownds met Tuesday morning online with commissioners as well as representatives from Cangelosi during the regular commissioners court meeting to present his findings and recommendations.

In his report to commissioners, Bownds said that while ground observations of the other three faces of the building (east, north and west) do not appear to show signs of limestone distress, the limestone elements on the south side are at a point that needs to be addressed “to limit further deterioration and risk of falling pieces.”

“It is CDC’s opinion that the south possess an immediate overhead risk from falling limestone pieces being ‘shed’ from the base element due to deterioration/delamination and overhead protection should be in place,” Bownds said, referring to placing of scaffolding around the south side of the building.

Bownds said the limestone elements of the building appear to extend as far as a foot to 15 inches back into the brick masonry mass wall, which would make it cost-prohibitive and difficult to remove and replace those features.

Instead, he recommends cutting back on the projecting sections of limestone and using an epoxy injection to fill any remaining cracks and putting on a new limestone profile to the front  where necessary.

“What we're proposing for Cangelosi to do is to come back in and try to shave back some of these elements to see at what point the cracking stops,” Bownds said while pointing to the limestone bases under the second-floor granite half columns. “Hopefully, the cracking will stop somewhere inside this bearing area, because there's a lot of force coming down on these and the delamination appears to be happening out at the fragile edges.”

Bownds said the second and third floor window sills are showing signs of deterioration along with the pilaster base shapes. However, the window headers on the second and third floors both appear to be in good shape with minor deterioriation.

One area in need of serious attention are the limestone handrails and balustrades on the second and third floors, directly above the main entrance. In fact, it was a piece of the second-floor handrail that came off and fell, prompting the building survey, Bownds said.

Bownds suggested removing the handrails and balustrades as they are heavily deteriorated, adding they are in no way incorporated into the façade.

He also noted excessive delamination at the base accent band of the penthouse region and signs of cracking in the penthouse capitols and cap stones. The ground floor center arch has a bearing crack that is starting to develop and needs to be addressed. Also, on the second floor balcony, a bearing crack has formed on the west side of the brick pilaster supporting the steel beam which supports the third floor balcony. This will need to be epoxy pinned to prevent further cracking and failures.

In all, Bownds presented seven steps he saw as necessary for façade renovation:

• Exfoliate all loose stone.

• Remove/shave areas of excessive cracking flush with the face of brick. Observe for cracking in the limestone back beyond the brick line of the wall.

• Epoxy cracks extending beyond face of brick line as best as possible.

• Dowel pin NEW limestone face into existing shaved profile if acceptable to commissioners.

• Alternate – Shave full elevation back to face of brick where possible to match previous shaved work or shave back to an acceptable profile similar to previous remediation work.

• Window sills are independent of load bearing wall and can be fully replaced. Windows will have to be removed. Window head has a lintel angle above window with will carry weight of brick above windows. Window joint sealant to limestone has reached the end of its life and failed in numerous locations.

• Balustrades can be removed and not replaced since glass handrail is present.

Chris Cangelosi of Cangelosi Stone Fabrication told commissioners work to repair the items Bownds found could take as long as six months and he recommended getting the scaffolding up as soon as possible, even though early voting is scheduled to begin this Monday, Oct. 21.

“It's a pretty serious scaffold that will have a protective walkway in front of the building,” Cangelosi said. “What we've got planned is that I'm going to need the front of the building — the full access. We're going to have to have a dumpster up there. We're going to have a forklift to be able to move things in and out as we're shaving and cutting these pieces off of the wall.

“We're going to have these big chunks that we're going to have to lower those down and get those into the dumpsters. So I'm going to need to crews up on the scaffold as well as we're going to have to crews on the ground, handling these pieces.”

Cangelosi said his crews would need to be working 40-hour weeks, but could do four 10-hour days in order to have Fridays be a day without construction going on during the work week. Cost to erect and dismantle the scaffolding alone is between $29,000 to $32,000 with a rental cost of about $2,900 per month and it will take about five days to get the scaffolding here in Gonzales and erected.

Total cost for performing the restoration work will depend on what commissioners choose to do, which is why Bownds suggested using the two stones on the third floor next to 419 St. George Street as a test run so commissioners can make an informed decision.