Wilson estimates go through roof

By Harold Gwin

Bids for the Youngstown school are expected to be $3.2 million above estimates.

YOUNGSTOWN — The final engineering estimates are in for the proposed new Wilson Middle School, and they aren’t good.

The construction bids for the new building are expected to come in at just over $12.3 million, some $3.2 million higher than the original 2004 estimate, according to Heery International Inc., project manager for the school district’s rebuilding program.

Wilson is one of 14 buildings being replaced or renovated in a $180 million to $190 million effort stretching over a half dozen years. The Ohio School Facilities Commission is picking up about 80 percent of that cost.

The school board approved the construction documents last week, agreeing to put the project out for bid.

Bids are to be opened July 29, and the new 66,568-square foot building, designed to house 350 pupils, is slated to open sometime in fall 2009. It will be built on Gibson Street, the site of the former Wilson High School.

Dr. Wendy Webb, superintendent, said Wilson will be the home of the district’s gender schools, which are now in separate buildings. Alpha: School of Excellence for Boys and Athena: School of Excellence for Girls will occupy separate ends of the new building, maintaining the gender separation for the seventh- and eighth-graders in those schools, she said.

Steve Ludwinski, Heery senior project manager, told the board that material and fuel costs have escalated since the 2004 project estimate was done, driving the cost of construction higher.

School officials said other factors raising the price include the board deciding to add some 2,000 square feet of common gathering space and changing some roofs from flat to sloped surfaces. Those are items the OSFC won’t pay for and the district will have to cover out of its local construction fund.

Officials said the new North Elementary School (now called Martin Luther King Jr. Elementary) came in at $8.5 million, 20 to 25 percent over the original budget last year, and that doesn’t bode well for the Wilson bids.

Still, there is a possibility the district could get better proposals from contractors than projected, Ludwinski told the board.

Construction companies seem to be very hungry for work and have been quite aggressive in more recent bidding, he said, referring to the Volney Rogers Middle School project, which came in at a total project cost of $10.8 million in May, only about $500,000 above its 2004 estimate.

There is no guarantee that type of aggressive bidding will continue, but there has been a lot of contractor interest in the Wilson job, Ludwinski said.

The actual construction is not the entire school cost. Engineering and a variety of other “soft” costs are expected to boost the total Wilson package as high as $13.7 million.

gwin@vindy.com