The Speech and Music Building, closed last year for renovations, hasn’t had any work done on it and might remain closed for some time.

The original plans had the building finished by fall of 2013; however, no work has begun on the building.

Bakersfield College head of Public Relations Amber Chiang, explained why there hasn’t been any work on the building.

“The modernization plans were sent to the state contractor, which is called DSA, and they have to approve those plans and when they approve those plans we go our for bid,” she said.

The school took out bids from contractors, but they all came in too high.

“Because of that, plans had to be redrawn so what was planned for the building had to be changed and plans had to be resubmitted to the DSA, and that’s where we are at.

“They have not been returned from the DSA with an approved for us to go forward and rebid to start construction.”

Most of the changes are things like changing the type of carpet used and the chairs in the auditorium.

“The problem is prices change constantly so we could do this process again and bids could come in too high again and we’re back to square one, again,” Chiang said.

Chiang said they’ve been waiting around six months for an approval from the DSA on current plans and there is no set time for when the state has to have the plans approved by.

As of now, there is no current day or estimate for when the SAM building will begin renovation.

Work was scheduled to begin on the SAM building in December 2011 and classes in that building have been held in other buildings on campus since the fall 2011 semester.