HENDERSON, Ky. − Building permits for a multi-million-dollar bathhouse for the underground coal mine that Alliance Coal is developing near Dixie and a $667,000 permit for remodeling projects at Henderson Community College highlighted new construction activity last month in Henderson and Henderson County.
Alliance’s Riverview Coal LLC secured a permit for construction of a $6.6 million bathhouse for Henderson County Mine’s Henderson Portal 1 at 6755 Sulphur Springs Road. The 30,000-square-foot building will also house administrative offices and a warehouse for the mine.
The $35 million mine is expected to employ 260 people at wages averaging about $34.50 per hour ($49 with benefits) and begin production in the first quarter of 2025. Henderson Portal 1 is expected to produce up to 6 million tons of coal per year, and has sufficient reserves to operate for 30 years, Alliance officials have said.
The HCC project includes remodeling the Cyber Café in the Sullivan Technology Center (STC) and a portion of the Academic/Technical Building (A/T). The goal is to restore functions that were lost when the former student center building, which engineers said was beyond its useful life, was demolished in 2022, and to create a new student hub to serve as a center of student activities and engagement.
“The Cyber Café will remain an enjoyable ‘lake-view’ space for students to hang out and study,” HCC President Jason Warren said in an email message. “However, the room is being enclosed with glass and redesigned so that may serve as a flexible-use space for numerous campus events and activities. The room will be equipped with flexible-use furniture that can be adapted to a multitude of campus functions (and then returned to a space for daily use by students). It will also provide valuable meeting space.”
The remodeled Cyber Café is envisioned as a successor to the former Joe’s Place multi-purpose room in the former student center, he said.
Next door in the A/T building, construction is underway on a full-service food services kitchen that will allow HCC to recruit a food services vendor. The food services vendor kitchen and the cafeteria were formerly housed in the SCR Building.
“Both projects are tentatively scheduled for completion by the end of August,” Warren said. “We hope to pursue a food services vendor via a bid process sometime this fall.”
Another former function of the student center — a bookstore — was relocated to the A/T building when HCC entered into a public-private partnership with Barnes & Noble to renovate space there.
Meanwhile, HCC is replacing doors and windows in the Administration Building (ADM) as both an asset preservation project and an energy-saving move. Warren said that will allow the college to “reallocate utility costs to students to our students and programs” by eliminating money that is “literally going out the window.”
ADM was built in 1960 and was the original — and, for a time, only — building on the campus.
Meanwhile, Ellis Park received a $112,094 permit for construction of a new observation and clocker tower.
Just one permit was issued for construction of a new single-family residence in May, compared with four in May 2022.
Through the first five months of this year, the city and county have issued permits for 15 new houses, matching the number issued during the same period last year.
The total value of all construction authorized by the city and county from January through May has totaled $136.9 million, which included a $119.8 million permit issued to Sebree Solar LLC in April for construction of a large solar energy farm near Robards.
Excluding the Sebree Solar project, the value of all construction authorized during the first five months of 2024 totaled $17.2 million, compared with $15.6 million during the same period in 2023.
Here are the construction projects authorized last month:
Building permits, May 2024
City of Henderson building permits
Commercial remodeling: Warehouse Services No. 5 LLC, 701 Pennell St., $75,000; I & J Services, 213 N. Main St., $28,500; Commonwealth of Kentucky (for Henderson Community College), 2660 S. Green St., $667,000; and Happe & Sons Construction Inc., Commonwealth Drive, $6,000.
Manufactured home, new: Annie E. Moore, 833 First St., $115,000.
Single-family residential accessory: Timothy Anderson & Gwendolyn Fisher, 1467 Kayak Dr., $4,000; and Gary & Conda Cooper, 4 Clements Pt., $108,100.
Single-family residential addition: Eric Stinson, 109 Clay St., $688,000; and Larry Glenn Jr. and Lan Briscoe, 3224 Sand Castle Dr., $9,000.
Single-family new residence: Randall H. Redding, 1224 Adams Lame, $140,000.
Single-family residential remodeling: Nela LLC, 600 Letcher St., $20,000.
Signs: Lighthouse Storage of Henderson, 5644 Airline Road, $1,044; Linda Baity, 311 Fifth St., $300; Cintas Corp. No. 2, Commonwealth Drive, $5,000; Sign Crafters Inc., 1503 N. Green St., $6,500 and $6,500 (two permits).
Total: $1.88 million
Henderson County building permits
Room addition: Patrick Morgan, 8408 John Steele Road, $53,500.
Commercial: Riverview Coal LLC, 6755 Sulphur Springs Road, $6.6 million; and Ellis Entertainment LLC, 3820 U.S. 41-North, $112,094.
Manufactured home: Bryan Townsend , 6788 Hatchett Mill Road, $81,400.
Garages/utility structures: Steven J Meredith, 8284 Crooked Road, $15,637; Joseph Adams, 2562 Holloway Lane, $5,000; Jason Perry, 8478 Tscharner Road, $52,000; and Martin G Smith, 3717 Holloway Lane, $36,205.
Total: $6.97 million
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