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US Marshals Museum Announces CDI Contractors as Consultant

2 min read

The U.S. Marshals Museum on Wednesday named CDI Contractors of Little Rock as the construction consultant for its planned 50,000-SF museum.

The construction firm, which is owned by publicly traded department store chain Dillard’s Inc. of Little Rock, will be responsible for helping the project’s architects update the construction budget. The museum expects the firm to be the construction manager once building begins.

“We look forward to working with CDI on this historic undertaking for Fort Smith and the nation,” Jim Dunn, the museum’s president and CEO, said in a news release.

Wholly owned by Dillard’s, CDI works in several industries, including nonprofits, health care, education, hospitality and government.

Polk Stanley Wilcox Architects of Little Rock and Cambridge Seven Associates of Cambridge, Massachusetts, are in the process of updating and completing the museum’s schematic design. Once that phase is complete, the architects and construction consultant will provide an updated cost for construction. 

The museum’s current $22.5 million estimate is from 2009. According to Dunn, the designers and architects hired in 2009 went through a “preliminary design process that was designed to stop at a given point.”

The architectural design process is three steps: schematic design, a skeletal outline of the building; design development, where the skeleton is filled in with details; and construction drawings that go to the builders.

“What we did originally was get halfway through the schematic design, so now the architects are working to complete the schematic design,” Dunn said.

This process will take several months, according to Dunn, and once it’s complete, planners will set a timeline for breaking ground based on the project’s updated cost and money raised. The construction period will last about 16 months, he said.

Dunn said fundraising is going well and remains on track, but that he would “always like to have more money raised.”

According to the museum website, planners have raised almost $29 million and still need to raise more than $32 million for the project to be fully funded. Dunn said those fundraising totals are updated quarterly.

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