Museum plans for barn

EPHRATA —  Grant County is starting plans to rebuild the big barn at the historical museum roughly eight months after it burned down.

The commissioners asked the public works department to design the shell for a new big barn to replace the structure destroyed by the August fire. The building acted as storage for the museum, holding artifacts ranging from a model of a American Indian encampment at Soap Lake to mammoth bones.

The insurance company released an estimate of $387,000 for the structure, Commissioner Carolann Swartz said. The insurance company agreed to give the county $200,000 of the money now to start paying for the project.

“You have to have money to get the project started,” she said. “We’re hoping everything comes together quickly.”

 The estimate does not include the items stored in the building. The insurance adjuster is still working through boxes of information on the destroyed items, Swartz said.

The public works department is creating plans for the shell and the concrete slab for the new building, but is not going to include any of the interior design elements, she said.

A list of possible features, given to the commissioners in October, include a two story building with storage on the second story and meeting rooms and a display area on the first floor.

Swartz said the historical society will coordinate with the county on planning.

“It’s not like you’re going to make it exactly like the old one,” she said. “They were thinking they would like to be up and running by June.”