High School Project Expected To Come In Under Budget

By John Voket

Town officials believe the Newtown High School expansion project will eventually come in around $1.4 million under budget when accounting for funds currently remaining in several contingency accounts.

The total cost for the project was approved at $41,576,000, which included $2.75 million for the design and $38,826,000 for construction, contingency funds, and all added “soft costs,” such as equipment and furnishings required to make the addition ready for use as intended.

The high school expansion has been in use for about one year, but nagging delays in completing a punch list of remaining work has kept the Public Building and Site Commission (PBSC) from signing off and releasing the project from its oversight.

In separate meetings, four members of the PBSC and Town Finance Director Robert Tait reviewed documentation including six pages of change orders along with financials to arrive at the rough final construction cost figure, and anticipated savings.

Robert Mitchell, chairman of the PBSC, said that the Morganti Group, which handled the expansion project’s management, would complete the work at its “guaranteed maximum price” — almost exactly $33.7 million. Mr Mitchell, was joined for the information meeting by fellow commissioners Tom Catalina, Joe Borst, and Robert Edwards.

Mr Mitchell expects one of the contingency allocations to cover noncapital costs, which Mr Tait said totaled $1.1 million, would have $170,000 remaining when all was said and done. He said this account was assigned to the “owner,” meaning the school district and the school board, not the town.

The construction manager’s contingency or CM account of $1.4 million — part of the $33.7 million base cost — is anticipated to leave about $400,000 remaining at the time the town signs off on the project.

Another contingency or “allowances” account of $1.4 million is expected to have $880,000 remaining when the project is finished, Mr Mitchell said. He added that this account was designed to cover increases in things like material costs that may have escalated significantly between the time the bid was accepted and construction was initiated.

Mr Mitchell also said the town is poised to file for its last phase of state reimbursements on the project, which he expects will total $12.8 million. The final anticipated reimbursement from the state will be about $2.4 million.

Clerk Was Invaluable

Mr Mitchell and his colleagues say that while the commission was not on board providing oversight during much of the planning process, once the group became involved, assuming a supervisory role, members quickly moved to control the change order process, which helped bring the project in on target.

“A job this size should budget about five percent for change orders and we held them to 4.5 percent,” Mr Mitchell said.

At the same time, all four commissioners praised the work of project clerk Bill Knight, who acted as the “eyes and ears of the commission” on site every day.

“Bill’s presence has paid for itself over and over again,” Mr Catalina said. “He provided front line protection of the town’s interests.”

The commissioners said that having Mr Knight, an experienced commercial construction professional, on site helped keep them in the loop when issues developed.

“With Bill on site, we were apprised of things on a daily basis, instead of getting wind of them once a month at our meetings. He saved us a ton of headaches,” Mr Catalina said.

“He reviewed and monitored changes very accurately, circumventing the need for us having to review them or walk the site,” Mr Mitchell added.

The commissioners said that beginning with the high school project, they have formulated a plan for future oversight of municipal building and site projects they hope to see formalized through a future charter revision.

That plan stipulates the types of projects the commission would be charged with overseeing; the manner in which projects would be referred to the commission; the means by which each project would be managed; and the commission’s general responsibilities.

The commission also developed a highly detailed and formalized change order process they implemented soon after coming on board with the high school expansion. Mr Mitchell said that formalized process eliminated the idea that contingency funds were just blank checkbooks available for any purpose not covered in the original plans.

“So if a teacher does a walkthrough and says, ‘I want this door moved from here to here,’ and it will cost $20,000,” the change order would have to be vetted through a multistage approval process before being funded, Mr Mitchell explained. “On some projects, they’d just write the check.”

Mr Mitchell said the PBSC will also do a thorough post-project review to glean any possible “lessons learned” to apply toward future projects. He said on the high school project the committee determined that every project going forward would be overseen by a two-member ad-hoc team, and that he wants to see the commission involved in proposed projects as soon as they are requested on the town’s Capital Improvement Plan (CIP).

“That’s because we have the expertise and protocol in place to get an accurate [cost] for the project, and get it right from the onset,” Mr Mitchell said.

Points To Clarify

The commissioners also sought to clarify a few points of misinformation or aspects of the project that had some unusually high costs. The greenhouse, in particular, has apparently generated rumors of extremely high costs.

But Mr Mitchell said the greenhouse base cost ended up being $92,000 before some added features and a change order to reposition some interior lighting fixtures. And because the new greenhouse is a qualified exterior classroom, it will now qualify for 38 percent reimbursement from the state.

Another $38,000 change order cost occurred when contractors sawed the bottoms off fire-rated interior doors, rendering them ineffective.

The contractors are expected to bear most or all of the costs to replace and rehang those doors. Another $216,000 was spent from contingency to meet other fire and safety requirements imposed by local or state building or fire officials, Mr Mitchell said.

The more than $750,000 spent for the new culinary department has created a state-of-the-art teaching center that will sustain the program well into the future, because designers accounted for some of the best quality commercial equipment, Mr Catalina said.

And the $3 million cost to reconfigure and raise the gymnasium roof has put Newtown in a position where it can now host a variety of state high school sporting tournaments.

“This new gym, along with the new [stadium] field complements Newtown’s personality regarding athletics,” Mr Catalina said. “Newtown is now a statewide benchmark for excellence in athletic facilities.”

Mr Tait said the town is currently retaining about $422,000 from the project budget to complete paying contractors once all the remaining work is completed and signed off. He said the anticipated $1.5 million does not represent actual cash left over from the project, but represents money the town will no longer have to bond.

In a related note, the commission received word that architect Joe Costa, who handled much of the lead design work on the high school expansion, is no longer with the design firm Fletcher Thompson. He will be replaced for the remainder of the project by Daniel Casinelli.