During a special meeting of the Board of Mayor and Aldermen (BOMA) Thursday afternoon, Vicksburg Mayor pro tempore Alex Monsour and District 1 Councilman Thomas “TJ” Mayfield approved and signed a contract to complete work on the city’s animal shelter.

Mayor George Flaggs Jr., who was out of town during Thursday’s special meeting, said last week he hoped final site work for the shelter would be completed in September.

Although the contract signed with DDD Construction & Sales has a term of 70 days and could extend into October, Monsour said Thursday that the board does not want to wait a day longer to get the work rolling.

“Normally the mayor would be here. He’s in Florida, but the reason I wanted to call this meeting today is because we don’t want to waste any time,” Monsour said. “We’ve already lost enough time. So the process is starting, the request to move on. The clock is ticking to get this completed and get all the animals into the new shelter as quickly as possible.”

Community Development Director Jeff Richardson said the execution of the $300,169.95 DDD contract gives the green light to complete site work on the new shelter on U.S. Highway 61 South.

“That’s for the driveway, walkways, parking lot and all the work around the building itself. And the fence,” Richardson said. “The building is ready for occupancy. That completes all the work on site.”

The original completion date for the accommodation was brought forward to 2024. Changes in the tender and construction further delayed work on the access road and the fence around the building.

“I’ll tell the engineer after that meeting that it’s approved,” Richardson said Thursday. “He’ll notify the contractor and then have a pre-construction meeting with him and then issue a building permit. And from that building permit, it’s 70 days.”