School board rejects high-school bids and vows to lower costs (Updated 5)

Updated yet again. Added more description and link to Bill Matthew’s letter to the school board on the bids. Also added more links to other reports. Be sure to read The Almanac’s article; it gives a pretty good summary of the meeting.

Tonight the school board voted unanimously to reject the bids for the proposed high-school renovation. The bids, which had been opened on April 19, 2011, had exceeded the project’s estimated maximum construction cost by more than $15 million, suggesting that the project’s total cost, once capped at $113 million, was in reality closer to $130 million.

Members of the school board vowed to bring the project’s cost down. While they hoped to preserve the existing design, they said that all options were open for consideration.

“There are no sacred cows,” said Josephine Posti, school board president.

School director Dale Ostergaard, pointing to upcoming pension obligations, said that the board must be realistic about how much it can afford. He said that the renovation’s cost must be sharply reduced, and that things previously non-negotiable must become negotiable.

Board members offered suggestions for lowing the cost: forgo LEED Silver certification, use split shifts for students to ease construction phasing, challenge the municipality’s “high-rise” fire-safety designation (but see Dan Miller’s blog post, linked to below), relax contractual terms for bidders to encourage lower bids, and others. Even some of the previously untouchable Fifteen Design Criteria were discussed.

Community member Dan Rothschild suggested revisiting Building C, which had been slated for demolition. Reusing Building C, as the Community Advisory Committee had advised the school board in late 2009, would be a more efficient use of an existing building and potentially keep all of the other programmed spaces intact, he said.

Community member Bill Matthews asked the school board to keep a closer eye on its hired architects and construction managers, who the school board had questioned earlier in the meeting about the unreliability of their project-cost predictions. Matthews had also written to the school board earlier, asking them to realize that the high bids were not caused by a problem with the bidders but with the complexity of the high-school project itself.

Other reports:

• Now is the time (Lebo Citizens blog)
• Mt. Lebanon school board rejects renovation bids (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette)
• Project Update (Center Court, Josephine Posti’s blog)
• Bids for high school renovation too high for Mt. Lebanon board (Pittsburgh Tribune-Review)
• Mt. Lebanon rejects renovation bids (The Almanac)
• Mt. Lebanon school board wants reasons for high bids (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette)
• Mt. Lebanon board awaits answers on high project bids (Pittsburgh Tribune-Review)
• Fire Safety Questions at the High School (Dan Miller’s blog)

High-school bids exceed $113 million, despite assurances to the contrary (Updated 3)

Updated 2011-04-20 09:39 to add link to school district’s announcement about the bids.
Updated 2011-04-20 18:24: the school district cancels the April 28 groundbreaking ceremony.
Updated 2011-04-21 10:17: local media are now reporting that the lowest bid came in $15.3 million higher than the the school district’s estimate.

Yesterday evening, the Mt. Lebanon school district revealed in a press release that bids for the proposed high-school renovation came in more than $14 million higher than expected. The lowest bid suggests a project cost of over $127 million.

Earlier, the school district had told the community that the project would cost no more than $113 million. This was the “maximum project cost” reported in the school district’s Act 34 declarations, back in January, 2010.

Since then, proponents of the project, both on and off the school board, had spread the belief that the project would cost less. One school-board director had said that “$95 million or less” was achievable. Another had written in her blog, “I'm confident that we will bring the project in below $113 million...”

Community activists contributed to the belief as well. Bloggers at Real Lebo had written that “cold, hard facts” about similar projects offered guidance about what Mt. Lebanon “could likely expect,” explaining that, “if you do the math, if our $113 M cap gets bids that are 20% less, that would bring our ACTUAL cost down to about $90 [million].” Similarly, the VOICE of Mt. Lebanon group claimed that the cost would be capped at $113 million and “could come in as much as 20% less...”

Speaking about the bids now, superintendent Dr. Timothy Steinhauer said they were “unacceptably high.”

The school district’s construction manager and architect are trying to figure out why the bids came in so much higher than expected. They will report their findings at a meeting scheduled for Monday, April 25, 2011, at 7:30 pm in the high-school library.

Update: groundbreaking ceremony canceled

The school district has now canceled the groundbreaking ceremony planned for April 28. From the school district’s web site:

The High School groundbreaking ceremony scheduled for April 28, 2011 is postponed while the Board deliberates on the outcome of the bids for the High School project.

Update: lowest bid $15.3 million higher than school district’s estimate

In updated coverage, the Post-Gazette and the Tribune-Review are reporting that the lowest bid was $15.3 million higher than the school district’s project cost estimate.

Read more:

• Mt. Lebanon postpones renovation project groundbreaking (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette)
• Bids for Mt. Lebanon high school renovation ‘unacceptably high’ (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette)
• Bids for Mt. Lebanon schools renovation higher than expected (Pittsburgh Tribune-Review)
• No $75 Million Plan, and No $113.3 Million Plan Either (Lebo Citizens)
• High School Bids Opened: Costs Exceed Estimates (Mt. Lebanon school district)