ASHLAND — Ashland County commissioners approved the demolition of three buildings on Thursday. 

The $57,680 contract will cover the demolition of the current Ashland County Dog Shelter on Garfield Avenue and two former houses along Cottage Street located on the same property. 

Commissioners awarded Ashland-based Bartley & Bolin the demolition contract after the company submitted the lowest of three bids. 

Cottage Street

Demolition of the two buildings at 337 Church St. is expected to start Wednesday, Aug. 30.

Crews removed “a little bit” of asbestos a few weeks ago, Ashland County Commissioner Denny Bittle said. 

Commissioners agreed to buy the property for $150,000 in January, thinking the house was unoccupied. It wasn’t. 

When they found out a family had lived in one of the houses for nine years, commissioners agreed to close after the family found a house.

The plan there, Bittle said, is to offer additional parking until the county finalizes a blueprint for a new office building. The facility would house county workers currently housed at the Ashland County Court of Common Pleas. 

“Everyone but the clerk and the courts (would move into the new office building),” Bittle said. 

He expects the projected 50,000 square-foot building to cost between $4 million and $5 million and take two years to finish. 

Dog shelter

The new, $3 million dog shelter along Baney Road will be open to the public by Sept. 11, when commissioners scheduled an open house of the facility from 4 to 6 p.m. 

Bittle said the dogs at the Garfield Avenue location will be moved to the new building the week following the Ashland County Fair. Once the dogs are moved, the 75 year-old building will be razed, Bittle sad. 

The vacant property will then be used for county fair parking. 

“The goal was to move the dogs in by Sept. 1, but it is what it is,” he said, adding construction and shipping delays kept pushing that date back.