The eight-month work stoppage at the Sallisaw veterans center in 2021 that began about a year ago before resuming Oct. 7 has an added twist today.

The Oklahoma Department of Veterans Affairs (ODVA) has retained legal counsel to investigate and pursue damages arising from the design and construction of the center.

With the approval of Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond, ODVA has engaged the Oklahoma City law firm Hayes, Magrini & Gatewood.

According to the headline on a Feb. 9 press release by the ODVA, the law firm has been retained to file a lawsuit against the architect on the project. The current estimate of damages is calculated to be approximately $21 million.

The release does not name the architect, but according to building permit documents on file with the City of Sallisaw, Orcutt-Winslow of Phoenix was the project’s original architect.

Multiple attempts to contact principals associated with parties to the proceedings — the Oklahoma Department of Veterans Affairs; Hayes, Magrini & Gatewood; and Orcutt-Winslow — for comment were unsuccessful.

According to Arkansas TV station 40/29, which attributed its information to the ODVA, “the company made significant mistakes during construction, and parts of the building were not up to code. [ODVA] has since hired a new company, which is fixing the construction problems.”

Your TIMES has been unable to independently verify the reporting by 40/29.

According to Keith Miller, Sallisaw building development director, the same contractor and subcontractors who began the project following the September 2020 ground breaking are currently working at the site.

For at least the past five months, however, semantics have muddied the project waters. ODVA executive director Joel Kintsel said on Oct. 25, 2022, that a dispute with the contractor was responsible for the work stoppage, but also said it was due to a change in the architectural and engineering firm.

“We had a work stoppage due to a dispute with the contractor, but that’s been handled, and things are back underway — October 7 we were back up,” Kintsel said on Oct. 25. “Technically, the project never stopped, it just slowed down for awhile.”

Kintsel further said that the work stoppage occurred because the ODVA “had to make a change in the A&E (architectural and engineering) team.”

Nonetheless, the ODVA said in its Feb. 9 release that construction will continue as legal action is pursued to recover damages for the State of Oklahoma. The ODVA said the project is nearly 50% complete, and that the projected date for opening the veterans center remains March 2024.

According to the Orcutt-Winslow website, the firm has more than 50 years of practice in architecture, planning and interior design. “Our work is a testament to the passion we share with our clients [and] the community.”

The architectural firm has designed many senior living facilities, including six veterans centers in addition to the Sallisaw facility — Arizona State Veterans Home in Tucson, Bowling Green Veterans Center in Kentucky, Idaho State Veterans Home in Post Falls, Kentucky State Veterans Home in Radcliff, Texas State Veterans Home in Houston and West Tennessee Veterans Home in Memphis. Photos on the firm’s website of the Houston facility bear a striking resemblance to the architectural drawings of the Sallisaw center.

The design portfolio for Orcutt-Winslow shows that the firm was also responsible for non-veterans-specific retirement communities in Arizona, Colorado, Nevada and Texas.

The firm was ranked 66th in the nation for Building Design + Construction’s 2020 Giants 400 Report. The ranking includes the nation’s top architecture firms for nonresidential and multifamily buildings work, and represents the impact Orcutt-Winslow made on the built environment during the past 50 years. (BD+C is a leading business content platform for architects, engineers, contractors and building owners/ developers.)

The firm has satellite offices in Irving, Texas; Shreveport, La.; Nashville, Tenn.; and Jeffersonville, Ind.

History of the project

Following the 2020 ground breaking at the 90-acre location on U.S. 59 south of I-40, construction of the long-term care facility made major strides during the ensuing year, with the skeleton of the 230,000-square-foot center quickly taking shape.

But for the majority of 2022, the massive center has consisted primarily of exterior walls overlayed with green house wrap.

“The project is back on track, and on schedule, and we’re meeting our deadlines, and this is going to be a great thing for the Sallisaw area and for the Oklahoma veterans that are served by it,” Kintsel said in October.

“On a project this size, it’s hard to know what challenges are going to arise and are unanticipated, that’s kind of the nature of something like this. We’re in a good place, and the project’s back underway. We’re very thankful for the community of Sallisaw and their support for the project. They’ve been absolutely wonderful.”

Kintsel said in October that ODVA incurred additional costs due to the change in architects.

“The additional expense is going to be about $15 million,” Kintsel acknowledged. “The actual cost of it prior to this situation with the architect would have been about $77 million.

“But with this additional amount, we’re lookin’ in the $92 million range. We’re trying very hard to control the costs where we can,” he said.

Veterans looking forward to moving into the new facility can be among the first to reside in the 180-room center.

“We maintain waiting lists for all of our veterans homes,” Kintsel said. “Even when they’re not ready or not even imminently prepared to enter the facility, they can put their names on [the list], so at the point that they do decide they’re ready to come in, there’s very little paperwork for them to do and they can just come.”

While Oklahoma veterans will be a priority for the new center, Sallisaw’s proximity to western Arkansas opens residential possibilities for out-of-state veterans as space allows.

“If there is capacity and there are veterans from the Arkansas side that qualify, we absolutely would serve them, too. The fact of the matter is we’re gonna serve any veteran that needs help. Obviously, if there’s availability that’s not being used by Oklahoma veterans and there are Arkansas veterans that need it, we would certainly serve them as well,” Kintsel said.

“The funding that we’re provided to carry out this mission, it’s federal dollars, and the feds are not going to quibble with whether or not it’s an Oklahoma veteran or an Arkansas veteran. If the need’s there, they’re gonna be pleased to support that.”

Before residents begin moving in when the facility opens in spring 2024, the center must be fully staffed.

“[Employee recruitment] will commence under the current schedule in the fall of 2023 — about six months before opening — late fall, early winter,” Kintsel said.

When completed, the Sallisaw veterans center will feature four buildings — three residential “neighborhoods” and a central community center. A neighborhood at the center is similar to a subdivision in a housing development. In two of the buildings currently under construction, a neighborhood consists of 72 residential rooms, with a third building comprised of 36 residences. The centralized community center will offer a reception area, dining room, a large room that can be used as a theater or a chapel, space for arts and crafts, a barber shop, a physical therapy room and a pharmacy to serve medical needs of the residents.

“This is a state-of-the-art facility. It’s a home-like environment, and will be the premier facility of its kind in the U.S.,” Kintsel said when he visited Sallisaw in October 2021. He said veterans with 70% disability or higher will not have to pay anything to stay in the facility.

Sallisaw beat out finalists Poteau and Muskogee for the new eastern Oklahoma veterans center location. At the beginning of the selection process, there were six communities, which also included McAlester, Hugo and Holdenville.