Budgets were approved for the new Center for Black Studies building and the campus parking structure at Thursday’s Board of Regents meeting.

The campus parking structure bids were presented to the Regents Thursday and the budget subsequently was approved.

The lowest bid which came in for the contract for the campus parking structure was $7,580,600, which is $1,009,400 lower than the original budget of $8,590,000.

Pepper Construction of Chicago presented the lowest bid and was awarded the contract for the parking structure.

Eddie Williams, vice president of Finance and Planning, said the economy contributed to the low bidding.

“This is a big project, and all the contractors really wanted the job,” Williams said. “There was a lot of interest in this job. The competition out there helped to keep the price down.”

The first bids that came in for the new Center for Black Studies building exceeded the original budget of $387,000, requiring NIU to make a request to send the project out for rebidding.

Extensive amounts of work went into lowering the cost per square foot from $130 to $94 per square foot, which in turn lowered the overall cost.

Although the second set of bids that came in were still $53,600 above the budget, they were significantly lower than the first set of bids. The Regents, however, approved the modified budget.

Rosenow Development of DeKalb presented the lowest bid and was awarded the contract.

Tom Rosenow, president of Rosenow Development, said he was very satisfied his company received the contract.

Rosenow said 11 alternates were eliminated from the original plans in order to reduce the cost of construction.

“They originally wanted a basement, but now the building will be built on a slab and only have a crawl space,” he said. “There were many other alternates that were eliminated also.”

Williams said the project should remain on schedule for occupation in the fall.

“The contractor has equipment on site and is ready to go at the green light,” he said.