ENMU construction on schedule

Jaime Martinez, left, and Francisco Navarrete of Maranatha Construction, lay trusses for the third floor of the new Eastern New Mexico University dorm on Wednesday.

Anthony Ortega, left, and Martin Porras of Bradbury Stamm stack dry wall on the second floor of the Eastern New Mexico University dorm construction site Wednesday. Foreman Bobby Ortega said the framing process for the building will be done in the next th

The construction and demolition ongoing at Eastern New Mexico University is right on schedule and running smoothly, according to Scott Smart, ENMU vice president of business affairs

"The last piece of the demolition was to fill in a hole at De Baca Hall. I think they just finished filling the hole today," Smart said Wednesday afternoon. "It was about on schedule. I thought they were going to be done (with demolition) just after the new year but it took a little longer than that."

The demolition of Lincoln Hall began in June 2011 with Chaves and De Baca halls following as two other demolition projects. De Baca was the most recent to be finished.

"We're going to xeriscape the two areas where Chaves and De Baca were at," Smart said. "Probably with some benches out there, especially where De Baca is at, because we thought it would be a nice place for people to go have lunch because there are dorms near there and staff offices."

Lincoln Hall will be replaced by a three-story freshmen dorm, called Guadalupe Hall, a $12 million project currently in the framing stage of its construction.

The funds for the dorm projects came from a $28 million state bond geared toward energy-saving projects.

Smart said building the frame of the new dorm, will be the quickest part of the process.

Maranatha Construction foreman Rudy Belo said the framing process will be complete in three weeks then the roof will be built and sheet rock will be laid.

"I think it's going to be a wonderful addition to the campus," Smart said of the new dorm. "It will be brick, like the administration building, so it will look really nice. We're pretty excited about that, the look."

He said the dorm will include 308 beds set up in two-bedroom suites.

ENMU and construction officials still anticipate the dorm being complete in the fall with students moving in January 2013.

"We will begin the landscaping in the areas that we demolished immediately," said ENMU President Steven Gamble. "It's going to have a lot of rock and some grass to make it nice for the campus as well as visitors. I think the whole campus is pleased with the progress we've made to our facilities."