WPCNR SCHOOL DAYS. By John F. Bailey. October 16, 2006: In a free form answering period before the tour, Superintendent of Schools Timothy Connors, Erik Kaeyer, the architect and the construction manager, Triton Construction, which worked together recently on the improvements to the Somers School District and other districts fielded questions from citizens concerned about the accuracy of the total costs.
Superintendent of Schools Timothy Connors introducing the briefing Saturday morning prior to the Post Road School tour. Photo, WPCNR News.
Nicholas Andreadis, the construction manager CEO, hired to evaluate the original Kaeyer, Garment & Davidson estimate, in response to one of the first questions said that when his firm went over the Kaeyer, Garment & Davidson original estimate, “We were relatively close to start with, within 1% or so. They were relatively accurate.”
Superintendent Connors addressed the needs of the district as a whole, explaining that the infrastructure improvements and design and construction on the four elementary schools, middle schools and high school were needed: “Just like your home, you can’t let it go. Even this building (Post Road School) and they are well-maintained. (Post Road) is considerably older. Renovating it is more expensive than replacing it. We’ve always invested in our schools and done it productively.”
Mr.Andreadis responding to a gentleman’s concern about contingencies and price escalations, said the costs of the work were based on the company knowledge of current market-based prices for similar projects, and 5% contingencies were built in.
Conners added that “we cannot do detailed design (and tight estimates) before (referendum) approval.”
He explained should the referendum be approved, detailed designs would be prepared by the architect, the Post Road and Mamaroneck Avenue school staffs consulted on finetuning the designs and then estimates would be prepared. Andreadis told WPCNR that after detailed designs were prepared, Triton would reestimate the project, based on the detailed construction designs (needed for contractors to make a tight budget call). and reestimate again before going out for bid. Mr. Kaeyer explained that it would take 4 months for the State Education Department to approve the construction. The Post Road new school would begin in the fall and be completed in the fall of 2009 according to Mr. Andreadis. Connors said if the cost of the project grew beyond the cost of the bond the district would have to consider eliminating certain elements. Though it was not explained whether the district could decide to finance any cost overruns separately itself.
Andreadis told WPCNR, in his experience the three things that could have the estimates already in to not match the market and that would be contractor availability, time to execute the project, and unforeseen conditions. It was not clear to this reporter whether the storm drain problems would be eliminated by building the new Post Road School higher up the hill where proposed.
Andreadis also told WPCNR his firm has a good track record on bringing in the estimated cost in line with contractor bids, because his firm bases it on a database of recent construction projects, and the latest established costs.
Mr. Kaeyer reiterated that it was not legal to do detailed construction designs delivering specific line-by-line estimates, in explaining why the line items were not detailed. However, the State Education Department Media Relations spokesperson, Tom Dunn, told WPCNR that the SED encourages school districts to get as detailed an estimate as possible to deterimine the monies needed before a referendum is put out. Dunn told WPCNR it is not illegal in any way to get detailed estimates.
Peter Bassano, a member of the Board Education took the floor and said, the members of the Board “had all these same questions,” and formed a committee (the Capital Projects Committee) to go over the project. “We even stacked the deck, putting persons on the committee who were very vocally against the bond and made one one (Mike Graessle) the Chairman of the committee.” ( The one critic most vocal was left off of the committee though, the lawyer, Charles Lederman, who raised issues about Dammon House and backflow valves when the estimates were released.)
“They went through the pages like you wouldn’t believe,” Bassano said, “in unbelievable detail and conclude it is in the best interest of the district to replace it (Post Road School) on site.” Bassano attributed the high costs cited by some critics for individual items to the conditions where one window meant actually three windows or was much larger than a regular window, and that the cost of one valve was actually the cost for 20 valves.
Bill Pollak, another school board member, and Acting President said critics of individual items on the estimates “were fundamentally misleading.” He said it was standard practice. “At the end of the day, we think this (the capital project) is very important to protect the incredible assets we have.”
WPCNR asked the Triton estimator if the estimates were essentially “ballpark” estimates. He said, “No, not ballpark. They are market-based.”
No questions were asked about how much the cost to taxpayers of the bond would decline after 2010. Others complained about the escalating cost to taxpayers.
The question of what the school district would do if the referendum did not pass tomorrow did not come up.
