Alfond Arena renovations almost done > Seats, painting unfinished

The renovated Alfond Arena, complete with nearly 1,600 new seats, will be unveiled when the University of Maine opens its men’s hockey season against Hockey East rival Providence College on Oct. 23.

But, with only 17 days until the opening faceoff, there is still some important work that must be done to finish off the $3.9 million project, a project that was supposed to be completed several months ago.

Dunne Brothers of Auburn and Yarmouth submitted the low bid ($9,000) to paint the steel underbody for the new seats several weeks ago. But the company has yet to begin the job.

Joe Dunne, owner of the company, could not be reached for comment on Monday. However, last Friday, he said he expected to begin the 10-day project on Monday.

Then, after the underbody was painted for cosmetic purposes and to help protect it from rust, the new seats were going to be installed by Criterion Inc. of New Hampshire. The seats are already here and Dick Eustis, the associate vice chancellor for facilities at Maine, said the installation of the seats will begin on Thursday, with or without a painted underbody.

The installation is expected to take a week.

“It’s a lot easier to paint before the seats are in place. But we’re prepared to have the seats installed,” said Eustis, whose hand is being forced by the uncertainty surrounding Dunne.

Eustis doesn’t know whether Dunne is going to do the job, renege on the contract or get another company to do the job for him.

“It’ll get painted eventually,” said Eustis, who may have to put the painting contract out to bid again.

Dunne had said that his company had been prepared to begin the job several weeks ago.

“But they couldn’t start painting until the acoustical treatment on the side of the roof was finished,” explained Eustis. “And that wasn’t finished until two weeks ago.”

“The delay screwed us up and then we got really busy,” explained Dunne.

Eustis expressed frustration, saying “If I had my druthers, we wouldn’t be cutting it this close.”

The situation has been a concern for Maine Coach Shawn Walsh, who would like to have the seats in place for the Blue-White scrimmage game on Oct. 16.

But he is taking things in stride.

“There’s only one percent left to go and I just want to see it finished,” said Walsh. “It’s disappointing but I have enough problems trying to get a young team to learn the little things that it takes to win games. Hopefully, they can get it finished by the 16th. We might have 5,000 people at the Blue-White game.”

Eustis said “I hadn’t heard anything about a Blue-White game. But it’ll be ready. It’ll definitely be ready by the 23rd.”