Leone & Keeble Inc., of Spokane, has negotiated or begun work on projects worth about $38 million that are scattered across the Northwest, says Paul Keeble, company president.


Additionally, its wrapping up construction on two other big projects that have a combined value of about $22 million, he says.


All of the general contractors new projects were negotiated, rather than awarded through a competitive-bid process, Keeble says. Ranked by size, they include a hospital expansion and two new college buildings in or near Walla Walla; a new medical office building in Kalispell, Mont.; and an ankle-and-foot clinic in Everett, Wash.


They also include a housing development in Moscow, Idaho, for the developmentally disabled; a planned new Telco Credit Union headquarters building on Spokanes North Side; and the remodel of a family medical practice building in Bozeman, Mont.


By far the largest project, at about $11.8 million, is an expansion and renovation at St. Mary Medical Center, in Walla Walla, which will include adding about 23,000 square feet of space to the hospitals cancer center, and about 14,000 square feet of space to its outpatient surgery area. Keeble says Leone & Keeble expects to begin work on that project in January and to complete it in August 2006. Mahlum Architects, of Seattle, designed the project.


Keeble says Leone & Keeble has been working with the Walla Walla hospital for several years on various phases of a major expansion and remodel there. St. Mary held an open house in September to celebrate the completion of the first phase, which included construction of a new front entrance, admitting department, emergency department, and heliport.


The Spokane general contractor has two other major projects lined up in the Walla Walla areaone for $8.9 million to build a visual arts center at Whitman College, and the other for about $7 million to build a new administration building at Walla Walla College, Keeble says.


Currently, it is providing pre-construction services on the Whitman College Center for Visual Arts project. Construction probably wont begin until at least March 2006 and will take about 16 months to complete, he says. The college is conducting a $10 million fund-raising campaign for the project, according to its Web site.


The 36,000-square-foot, two-story structure will include sculpture and art-major studios, drawing rooms, ceramics classrooms, painting areas, a digital art lab, exhibit space, and faculty offices and studios.


Thomas Hacker Architects Inc., of Portland, which has designed other structures at Whitman College, is the architect on that project.


At Walla Walla College, a Seventh-day Adventist institution in nearby College Place, Wash., Leone & Keeble expects to begin work next spring on a new five-story, 43,000-square-foot administration building. The Journal reported early this year that the Spokane contractor had landed a design-build contract to do the project. Construction is expected to be completed in about August of 2006.


The new structure is to be built at the east end of the campus on the site of the schools former administration building, which was built in 1892 and demolished late last year. Salmon Bay Design Group, of Seattle, is the architect on the building-replacement project.


In Kalispell, Leone & Keeble is just beginning construction of a $6.3 million medical office building for a doctors group there, Keeble says. It expects to complete that two-story, 45,000-square-foot structure by December 2005, he says.


Salmon Bay is the architect on that project and also for the new single-story, 8,500-square-foot ankle-and-foot clinic in Everett, north of Seattle, that Leone & Keeble expects to begin building in February. It expects to complete that $1.3 million project also by December 2005, Keeble says.


In Moscow, the contractor has landed a $1.2 million contract to build a federally funded housing complex for the developmentally disabled. It expects to begin work on the four-building project next month, Keeble says. Castellaw Kim Architects, of Lewiston, designed the complex.


In Spokane, Leone & Keeble has been awarded a $1.1 million contract to construct an earlier announced new headquarters and branch building for Telco Credit Union at 9707 N. Nevada, and expects to begin work on that project next month, Keeble says. ALSC Architects PS, of Spokane, designed that structure.


Leone & Keeble also expects to begin work next month on a $500,000 remodel of a 6,600-square-foot family medical practice building in Bozeman. That project is expected to be completed in March, Keeble says.


Separately, Leone & Keeble is moving toward completion of major education projects at Big Bend Community College, in Moses Lake, Wash., and Lewis-Clark State College, in Lewiston, Idaho, he says. At Big Bend, its about 98 percent complete with a $10 million library and classrooms project, and at Lewis-Clark, its about 75 percent finished with a $12 million project that includes sports, classroom, and administration facilities, he says.