For this edition of Construction Chronicles, Claire Rumpsa chatted with Dan Fisher to learn more about the progress on the Ed Wing HVAC units.
Claire Rumpsa: What is the latest news on the Ed Wing HVAC [heating, ventilation, air conditioning] units? I have heard that it’s been more complicated to plan this project. Can you share more?
Dan Fisher: First, some background. The motivation for this project is to upgrade the systems to provide filtered air and bring in outside air. These are our requirements, driven by COVID, to provide the safest environment we can for the students and caretakers. This is similar to what we did in the Sanctuary.
It was a huge milestone for us to get a plan in place for the Ed Wing. We’ve selected the HVAC systems and a contractor to work with. We have the cost estimate, and the long lead time equipment has been ordered. Currently, the lead time for the major HVAC equipment is about six months.
The HVAC systems have a lot of penetrations through the roof to get the duct work down into the building. The HVAC people are providing measurements for duct work and working with the roofing contractor to prepare for the HVAC systems. At the same time, we are kicking off the contract for the replacement of the roof in this area.
This 2017 photo shows four of the five current HVAC units on the Ed Wing roof. When the project is complete, these units will be replaced for a total of eleven units supporting both first- and second-floor classrooms.
Connecting the HVAC units on the roof to the first floor is a real challenge, as we will have to run ductwork down through second-floor cabinets and other areas to reach the first floor. We’ve had to get creative! Even though there are some delays in getting some of the equipment we need to finish the project, we will be able to move forward with some other stuff in the meantime: electrical, roof penetrations, cabinetry, etc.
What does the overall timeline look like for completing this project?
The delays in getting the right equipment mean we’re looking at sometime later in the year before we finish the project. We’re hoping to get this completed by November or December at the latest.
What are we doing in the meantime?
We’ve provided small AC [air conditioning] units for some classrooms where the old units have already failed. This provides some cooling during the summer months. These units are not able to do air filtration or provide fresh air, so we’re really looking forward to having the full HVAC system up and running later this year.
Our next HVAC project will be the replacements of units for Commons 1, Commons 2 and offices. The good news is that this is coming in at a significantly lower cost than we anticipated. Overall, the combined HVAC system upgrades, which include the Sanctuary, Ed Wing, offices, etc., are only costing about 6 percent over our initial estimates. That’s pretty good considering the rapidly escalating prices of equipment and materials.
Our third interview is with Ben Sikkink, Hope Church’s Building Administrator who also serves on both Building and Grounds and Facilities Strategy groups. Today we’re going to learn more about the Education Wing lighting project. A reminder that initial pledges are requested by June 1; pledges may be made online or using the cards provided.
Claire Rumpsa: Can you tell us more about why the Ed Wing lighting upgrades were a priority for the Sustaining Hope Campaign?
Ben Sikkink: The primary motivation for the Ed Wing lighting project was saving energy because we’re changing from fluorescent to LED lights. To me also it was an aesthetics issue—the lights that are in that part of the building are probably the original lights from when it was constructed in 1962. The old lights had plastic lenses that have become loose and discolored over time. With fluorescent lights, you get different levels of lighting—some blue, some yellow, some orange, and some that don’t light. It was time to get uniform lighting in place.
We as a church are responsible to provide adequate lighting, heating, and basic comforts for the CDS daycare center. When I walked through the Ed Wing during the Facilities Fair, I counted that 40 out of the 200 lights were not working at all. It was time to either do some serious maintenance or get started on replacement. Replacing the lights now will save us both money in energy use and time in general maintenance going forward.
What is the latest update on the Ed Wing lighting?
A couple of the upstairs rooms are nearing completion. We’re trying to work out schedules that work with the day care center, as it’s in constant use during the week. The entire project should be complete within two weeks. We were surprised that the light fixtures and controls all came in on schedule.
We’re changing to motion-sensor controls, which will also help with energy savings. The best way to save electricity is that people switch off lights as they leave, but this is second best option, which removes human error! This will also increase the safety of the Ed Wing as the lights will come on automatically as people enter the rooms.
Have there been any surprises or interesting discoveries along the way?
So far it’s been good discoveries! We were able to reuse the same bolts as the original lights, which is making the installation easier. We were concerned that the ceiling behind the old lights might be discolored, but thankfully, you won’t notice the change.
An interesting aspect of the project is coming up with a solution so the new motion-sensor lights don’t come on during the children’s naptime! We’re coming up with a good way forward on that.
Any final thoughts on the Sustaining Hope Campaign?
It’s great to see these particular projects getting done. The whole aspect of building up the Building Maintenance and Repair Fund so that we’ll have money available when tasks like lighting or roof replacement come up in the future is also great. Having these funds available will mean that we are able to do projects like this without having another capital campaign.
Once a month, Capital Campaign Team member Claire Rumpsa will sit down with someone involved in the Sustaining Hope construction projects so that we can share more about the important work that’s going on behind the scenes. Our second interview is with Dan Fisher, who continues to wear a lot of different hats at Hope Church as leader of the COVID Task Force and Facilities Strategy Committee and a member of Consistory and the Capital Campaign Team. Today we get some updates on the HVAC units in the Sanctuary and learn more about the HVAC projects in the Education wing.
Claire: The HVAC in the sanctuary is almost done! Any updates on that? What can we expect to see/hear/feel as a result?
Dan: The two main priorities for this project were to optimize air filtration with MERV 13 filters and bring in outside air; these two things are now fully functional! In terms of the overall project, we’re 97 percent of the way there and the rest is fine tuning and calibration. We were in the sanctuary last Tuesday with our HVAC consultant and contractor, Paul Elzinga, and Ben Sikkink and turned on the system. We were really happy with the noise level from the four HVAC units, but the new energy recovery units are giving more noise and vibration at the moment. We will fine tune these systems to substantially reduce the noise levels; we’re confident that we can make significant progress on that. People probably didn’t notice any of this during the service on Sunday but our team was listening carefully! We will also adjust the air supply grills and modify the air flow direction for the best air distribution in the Sanctuary. We’ll also fine tune the temperature adjustments: This is all part of the final calibration stage.
Can I ask you to put on your COVID task force hat for a minute and tell us what this means for our COVID mitigation strategy? It was a big moment at church last week to see that masks are now optional in the Sanctuary.
We have several metrics that we considered that allowed us to get to the masking optional stage: .
Current CDC guidelines: We are currently in the green zone.
HVAC: We currently have four HVAC units operational, bringing in outside air and providing MERV 13 filtration. This was a very important consideration and a huge step up from where we were before.
MIT COVID Safety Guidelines: One thing that has really helped us in our decision-making is an algorithm from MIT. It allows us to enter a number of variables to determine what we need to do to gather safely in the sanctuary. For example, we input the percentage of people who have been vaccinated, the level of risk we want to consider (we are pretty conservative), the type of virus (currently Omicron 2, so the algorithm adjusts for increased transmissibility.) Then we input building information: the size of the space, the type of air filters, how much air circulation within the room, and how much outside air we bring in. Then we consider what we are doing in the space, e.g., singing. We also consider the percentage of people masking and the type of masks they wear, the number of people in the space, and the current Ottawa County reports for the number of new COVID cases/week in our community. The algorithm takes all that information and helps us determine the length of time that the designated number of people can gather safely.
Hope Church Guidelines: We have also developed a rating system at Hope Church that considers factors like our internal COVID protocols, HVAC, vaccination rates, and community test positivity and new cases. We currently rate pretty high.
All of these things added up to the COVID Task Force saying yes to being together with masks optional. The HVAC unit was a requirement for us: We have to do our part as a church to provide our congregation with the safest place that we can offer. We will continue to monitor the situation closely and will keep a close eye on all of these metrics.
Last week when the CCT met, the plan for the HVAC system in the Ed Wing was still in development. What are the factors under consideration?
First of all, this is a really important project and the results will be great for the children and teachers using that part of our building. It will be a good system for minimizing COVID and other “stuff” that children pass around. We have come up with a design concept that we want to move forward with and are working to get cost quotations on it now.
The roof of the Education Wing
Every project has its complicating factors. In the Ed Wing, we are looking at setting up eleven different HVAC systems on the roof to serve the first and second floor classrooms. Getting the air down to the first floor is a challenge; we’ll need to feed ductwork through some second-floor bookcases, shelves, and closets. There will also be some interesting work in setting up the control systems. We’re trying to make it as easy and simple for installation. Unfortunately, the cost of equipment continues to go up as the world experiences supply issues; the cost of duct, for example, has nearly doubled recently. We are waiting for the final quotes to come in. When we get to the point where we can give the go-ahead, the lead time for the major equipment will likely be twelve to sixteen weeks.
Any other general updates to share? Will you be at the Renovations Fair on April 24?
The only other active project at the moment is a new roof on the Ed Wing; we’re getting quotes in on that now. I’ll be at the Renovations Fair to answer any questions that the congregation might have on the construction work. I’m happy to answer any COVID questions too!
I also want to recognize once again the people on the Facilities Strategy Team working on all this: Paul Elzinga, Clare Heyboer, Sam Martin, Ben Sikkink, and Gordon Wiersma. If you can believe it, we have been together for five years working on Hope Church facility issues. It’s my pleasure to work with such dedicated and competent team members.
The Capital Campaign Team has reactivated this website as a way to share information about the various projects underway or planned. Team member Claire Rumpsa will each month interview one of the people involved in the Sustaining Hope construction projects, as she says, “so we can share more about the important work that’s going on behind the scenes. Our first interview is with Dan Fisher, who wears a lot of different hats at Hope Church as leader of the COVID Task Force and Facilities Strategy Committee and a member of Consistory and the Capital Campaign Team. We’re going to learn more about the HVAC [heating, ventilation, air conditioning] upgrades. Thankfully, Dan is very enthusiastic about this subject and I left the interview with a new-found appreciation for fresh air and filtration!
Claire: Can you tell us why the HVAC unit upgrades were the top priority for the Sustaining Hope Campaign?
Dan: COVID was a big driver for focusing on the HVAC upgrades. From a COVID Task Force point of view, we consider a lot of things to protect our members: vaccination rates, transmission rates, masks, distancing, and, of course, the quality of air. Getting more fresh air into the building and filtering it properly are important priorities, and we had some big concerns about the existing units. In the Sanctuary we were basically recirculating the same air over and over again in both heating and cooling seasons and without any filtration. COVID made addressing HVAC inadequacies an immediate priority.
The HVAC units in the Education Wing are very old and need to be replaced. They had been in our sites for a while and COVID accelerated that process. There was a strong feeling among the facilities team, the COVID Task Force, and Consistory that we needed to make the Education wing HVAC upgrades a priority alongside the Sanctuary upgrades considering the Ed Wing building is used all week by many children and CDS staff.
What is the latest on the HVAC installation?
I’m part of a great team alongside Paul Elzinga and Ben Sikkink, and we have a very competent HVAC consultant and contractor working with us, too. There’s a lot of good, creative technical thinking that happens at our meetings—and we’re very conscious that we need to stay within our cost framework in our decision-making.
Things are going well in the Sanctuary. We have a new trap door to the basement to give easier access for the work that needs to be done. The two back cooling units are now able to bring in outside air and have been fitted with MERV-13 filters, which are fine enough to capture COVID particles. We have also added energy recovery ventilators, which mean that in the heating season, the warm exhaust air is used to make the cold incoming air warmer—and vice versa in the cooling season, when the cooler exhaust air will be used to make the warm incoming air cooler. It’s a very cool system and good for energy management!
We’ve also moved one of the AC units that used to be under the steeple down into the basement and added the energy recovery ventilator. We’ve added sound attenuators to all units, which will help us reach a secondary goal of making the HVAC systems much quieter. The congregation should notice a big difference in the noise levels!
One clever thing is that we also used an existing HVAC system that has the ability to support either the Gathering Area or the Sanctuary, depending on which area is being used at the time. It can be switched between each zone as needed. This helped us to keep costs down.
Have there been any surprises along the way?
It is kind of crazy to see all the duct work that’s now in place in the basement! There are air-intake ducts from the west side of the building feeding three energy recovery units, which are connected to the HVAC systems; then the duct work goes over to the east side, where the exhaust goes out of the building. You really have to watch your head when you go down there, as there is duct work everywhere!
When can we expect to have the Sanctuary and Ed wing units running at full capacity?
The Sanctuary units should be finished by the end of March. Even now in the interim, the southwest and northwest units are up and running, so we are getting partial benefits along the way.
The Ed Wing project has proven to be a bit more complex, but our team is working hard to come up with a good solution given the technical and cost constraints. There are eleven new units that will feed the rooms on the first and second floors. All of the units will be located on the roof, and there will be no HVAC equipment in the rooms themselves, as we have now. We are still working on finalizing the plans and understanding equipment availability and timing. As with the sanctuary, the new systems will bring in outside air and filter the air with MERV-13 filters. At the same time, we will replace the roof on the building, which is long overdue.
On a scale of 1 to 10, how creepy are the attic and basement of Hope Church?
[Laughs] I actually find it fun to go down to basements and attics. The Hope Church basement had some interesting old things—benches and old windows. The attic is a riot [If you say so Dan!] You could really get lost in the maze up there and not find your way out. There are ladders and passageways leading in different directions. Seriously, though, we are considering a buddy system so that we can ensure anyone who goes up there is safe and accounted for!
Any final thoughts for today?
It’s really fun working with both teams,the Facilities Strategy team and the COVID Task force. The Facilities team has been in place for five years and we work very well together; I have so much respect for everyone on the team. Everyone contributes in a lot of different ways and we are very fortunate to have this expertise in our congregation. Ben Sikkink’s role in overseeing building maintenance means we are staying on top of maintaining our building and there are fewer surprises along the way. An old building is never done, but this team, with support from the staff and congregation, is making sure we are taking good care of it.
As winter weather nears, it’s good to note progress on our exterior work in restoring the integrity of the sanctuary brick and stone and in rebuilding the structure of the bell tower. This week, the exterior brick is being cleaned of mortar and brick dust; next up is plaster repair on the interior walls, especially cracks under the east and west rose windows, followed by painting.
For those of you curious about what’s happening in the tower in preparation for replacing the bell and steeple, see the photos below, provided by our colleagues at Elzinga & Volkers. All of the parts of the plan are proceeding, although not in the projected sequence owing to some unexpected discoveries (the tower is out of square–can you believe it?). We hope next week to announce a celebratory “viewing party” when the steeple is lifted back into place, likely the week of November 26 (and subject to weather, especially, and additional unforeseen complications). Stay tuned for details!
A new edition of the the Living Hope Construction Update is available now, and there are several ways you can read it: online, on your computer, from a copy you print, or from a copy you pick up at the Welcome Center. As part of their communications during the project, Elzinga & Volkers, our construction management partners, provide this monthly newsletter to keep everyone–near or far–informed about progress.
Follow this link to read it online. Note the controls at the bottom of the screen: the scroll bar on the left lets you flip through the pages; the shorter scroll bar to the right lets you zoom in and out for legibility; and the square in the lower-right corner will make the newsletter full-screen. The arrows to the right and left of the newsletter also will let you turn the page.
If you prefer to download the newsletter to read it in a PDF viewer (like Adobe Reader) or print it on your home printer, follow this link to the PDF.
A limited number of printed copies will be available at the Welcome Center–while supplies last!
If you’ve been in the youth room recently, you’ve seen our reupholstered sofas, which were apparently highly sought after during a recent movie night. We have some leftover upholstery fabric, inspiration for accent pillows, and some not-yet-coordinated floor cushions. Is there anyone among the very talented Hope Church community who’d like to stitch up some pillows for use in that space? And some covers for floor cushions?
If you’re interested, contact Lois Maassen directly, through the church office, or via the contact form on this website.
As the construction of the Living Hope project wraps up, we seek volunteers to help clean! We’ll be washing walls and windows, vacuuming new carpets, wiping out cupboards, removing stickers from glass… whatever it takes to make the newly finished rooms ready for furniture and use!
We’re looking for volunteers for four dates; we’ll choose the options that work best or cancel dates when the work is done. Please follow this link to indicate which of the dates might work for you. Under consideration are
Tuesday, February 7, 9:30 a.m.
Wednesday, February 8, 9:30 a.m.
Thursday, February 9, 9:30 a.m.
Tuesday, February 14, 9:30 a.m.
Once again, many hands make light work, and we can prove it with your help!
The January edition the the Living Hope Construction Update is available now, and there are several ways you can read it: online, on your computer, from a copy you print, or from a copy you pick up at the Welcome Center. Elzinga & Volkers provides this monthly newsletter to keep everyone–near or far–informed about progress.
Follow this link to read it online. Note the controls at the bottom of the screen: the scale at the left allows you to zoom in for legibility; the arrows in the center let you page through; and the two diagonal arrows on the far right will show the newsletter full-screen.
If you prefer to download the newsletter to read it in a PDF viewer (like Adobe Reader) or print it on your home printer, follow this link to the PDF.
A limited number of printed copies will be available at the Welcome Center–while supplies last!
The Nicodemus Bosch memorial rose window has been placed in its new home, on the south wall of the new chapel! There’s more work to be done, as layers of glass will protect the historic stained glass, but it’s exciting–and stress-reducing for our construction team–to see this step toward completion.
Judy Parr’s history book says this about the window: “In the late 1940s, Emma Bosch and the Randall C Bosch and Gerald J. Bosch families donated a rose window in memory of Nicodemus Bosch. Originally placed above the Last Supper woodcarving on the north wall of the chapel, it was removed to accommodate pipes for a new organ installation in 1965….”
Most recently, the window has been in the wall between the library and the Gathering Area.
Again, from Judy’s research: “The window, with a Communion chalice at the center, symbolizes the ‘communion in Jesus Christ which is essential to… our worship, fellowship, and social ministry.'”
Its symbolism and history make the window an especially meaningful element of our new chapel.
SUSTAINING HOPE 