Leone & Keeble Inc., of Spokane, is the apparent low bidder, with a bid of $12.2 million, for an expansion and partial remodeling project at Patterson Hall, one of the main academic buildings on the Cheney campus of Eastern Washington University.

Construction of a 34,000-square-foot addition and remodeling of 27,000 square feet of the 103,000-square-foot building is scheduled to begin in September and to run through June 2012.

About $24.2 million in funding for all costs associated with the project has been approved by the Washington Legislature. Included in it are asbestos abatement and interior demolition work needed for the renovation and new construction, as well as the moving of steam and electrical utilities from inside Patterson Hall to trenches outside the building to maintain service to the nearby Isle Hall during construction. Leone & Keeble also won contracts totaling $1.4 million for that work, which is currently in progress at the campus.

The two-story addition and renovation of the structure will reconfigure the interior to add two classrooms and 40 new offices to Patterson Hall, EWU's largest instructional building. The new design allows seating capacity in all of the classrooms to increase by about 40 percent, says EWU project manager Jim Moeller.

NAC/Architecture, of Spokane, designed the project.

Faculty offices formerly housed in Patterson Hall have been temporarily relocated to the Walter Reid Elementary School building on campus, which previously was vacated by the Cheney School District. Classes in the various departments of the College of Social and Behavioral Sciences and the College of Arts and Letters that have historically convened at Patterson Hall will continue to be held elsewhere on campus and in temporary classroom buildings, and the university has altered its class scheduling to get by with less space.

EWU spokesman Dave Meany says the academic building will not be occupied until the rest of the building has been renovated. A funding request for that will go before the Legislature during the 2011 legislative session. That work, estimated to cost $38.6 million, will include renovation of the remaining 76,000 square feet of the building, plus landscaping, furnishings, and equipment purchases. The total cost of the renovation and expansion of Patterson Hall is estimated at $64.8 million, Moeller says.

Final completion and occupancy of the building is scheduled for April 2014. The design phase of the project began in 2007.