Magers Enterprises LLC earns developer honors

The Salute to Construction Council held its 21st annual awards banquet at the Clarion Hotel on Nov. 3 with the Springfield Contractors Association honoring the Developer of the Year, Architect of the Year and Engineer of the Year.

The night’s big winners were Magers Enterprises LLC – Developer of the Year, Sapp Design Associates Architects PC – Architect of the Year and Smith-Goth Engineers Inc. – Engineer of the Year.

“It gives us a chance to recognize excellence within our industry,” said Salute Council coordinator Kim Buche.

Bill Magers and his sons Randy and Bryan Magers were recognized for their Battlefield Market Place development, a 46,400-square-foot, $7.5 million project near Battlefield and National in Springfield.

The Magers family has been developing Springfield since the early 1970s, with Old Town Shopping Center, Village Shopping Center, Town & Country Shopping Center and Deerfield developments, Battlefield Office Building and Regency Shopping Center to their credit.

“If there weren’t people to take the development risk, there wouldn’t be jobs for all the people in our industry,” said presenter Bill Nesbitt, SCA president and owner of Nesbitt Construction Inc., before the banquet. “That’s the one reason we salute the Developer of the Year.”

Architect of the Year

The team of Michael Sapp, Jim Stufflebeam and Kent Sanders earned Architect of the Year for their efforts in expanding James River Assembly of God in Ozark.

David Atkisson nominated the Sapp team after working with them on what he estimated was a $10.5 million project that included a new children’s wing, 500-seat wedding chapel and 668 new seats in the existing sanctuary.

“It was a large, fairly complex project with multiple phases,” said Atkisson, Walton Construction Co. Inc.’s project manager for the James River Assembly of God renovation. “It just had specific project challenges.”

Atkisson said Sapp’s point man on the project, Kent Sanders, “had a good attitude (and was) very positive.”

Engineer of the Year

Business partners David Smith and Norman Goth earned the Engineer of the Year award for their efforts with park re-lighting and the Cooper Tennis Complex addition.

Smith-Goth worked on re-lighting five city parks – Fassnight, Grant Beach, Silver Springs, Smith and Sequiota – with historical fixtures.

The firm also is providing mechanical and electrical engineering for the $3.4 million additions to Cooper Tennis Complex, consisting of six indoor tennis courts, mezzanine, meeting room, kitchen-equipped lobby, storage areas and restrooms.

John Melton, owner of Melton Electric Co., nominated Smith-Goth after working with the partners on the Cooper project.

“Springfield’s blessed with a lot of great engineering firms, but I’ve (had) a lot of personal exposure with (Smith-Goth) this year and (I’m) quite impressed with their drawings, their clarity and, also, their paperwork,” Melton said.