Mayor Carolyn Kirk has asked the School Committee to hold off on a request for more funds from the city until the bids to add 14 modular classrooms to the schools are unsealed next week.
Despite the School Committee's worries that funds will fall short because the initial budget was underestimated, Kirk said in a phone interview yesterday that she was confident the project will be completed within the $3.45 million allocated and approved by the City Council in January.
"I'm pretty confident," Kirk said. "I'd be surprised to see the bids come in in a way that won't allow the project to get done."
Kirk said she asked the committee, at a special meeting Monday night, to postpone its request for more money for several reasons. First, no dollar figure was attached to the request, because at this point, the committee isn't sure about the shortfall.
"The School Committee and the city will not know until the bids are open if there is a funding shortfall," Kirk said. "I don't want them reacting to a problem that hasn't yet happened."
The committee's request stemmed from the revelation last month by Superintendent Christopher Farmer that he may have underestimated by as much as $900,000 the cost of adding 14 classrooms to the city's elementary schools.
At that time, Farmer said that because the city does not allow the school department to hire an architect until after the City Council has approved the funding, initial estimates left out the costs of square footage for corridors and bathrooms required by building code for the modulars to be added to the schools.
The school department is hoping to add six modulars to Beeman Elementary School, five modulars to Plum Cove Elementary School, a modular to East Gloucester Elementary School and two to Veterans Memorial Elementary School.
The School Committee is also planning to remodel an "outbuilding" at Plum Cove at an estimated cost of $35,000 to $55,000, depending on whether the high school vocational students could assist with the work. That amount is not included in the $3.45 million modular project, according to Farmer's report to the Building and Finance Subcommittee last week.
After learning of the potential shortfall, city Purchasing Agent Everett Brown designed a bid process that allowed for slightly used modular units to be included, a move that he said would make it likely to keep the contract under $3.45 million.
The bidding process has opened, and bids will be unsealed on Tuesday. The city is scheduled to award a contract by April 4.
According to an official at the Purchasing Department, six contractors appeared for the mandatory bid meeting and site visits to the schools. The bidders asked for a few extra days to turn around the paperwork, resulting in the unsealing being bumped from Friday to Tuesday, Kirk said.
School Committee members quickly backed off the request to the mayor at Monday night's meeting, agreeing to postpone it until after hearing whether the bid process was successful. Chairman Gregory Verga said that the request was more of a "placeholder" and a way to make Kirk and the City Council aware of the situation.
The debt service on the $3.45 million loan would be $426,000 per year.
Officials have expressed concern that if the bids come in over the budget and they have to go through the process of asking the City Council for more money, the project's tight time schedule could be delayed.
There is very little flexibility in the current construction schedule. The buildings are expected to be installed by Aug. 15, giving teachers about two weeks to move into the classrooms before the schools' post-Labor Day start.
"Until Everett Brown comes into my office and tells me this thing's in trouble — and that hasn't happened yet — I'm not worried about it," Kirk said yesterday.
The addition of the modular classrooms will help to accommodate grade five, which was housed this year at Fuller School. Fuller was disbanded as an elementary school and its kindergarten through fourth-grade students sent to schools across the city last fall.
Five hundred children were moved in the redistricting.
Additional classroom space
The following numbers detail the projected state of space at each school with the addition of the modulars as currently planned. The difference between number of classrooms and rooms planned are the rooms available for art, music, special education and other activities.
School Number of Classrooms Total Rooms Planned Average Class Size Total Students
Beeman 17 or 18 23 21.8 392
Plum Cove* 10 14 17.4 139
East Gloucester 13 15 22.1 265
Veterans 14 17 18.8 244
West Parish 20 23 21.3 404
City Average Class Size: 20.6
*Reflects Plum Cove with only K-3 in 2008-09.
Source: School Committee documents
