Letter: Total costs for STEM School, Eastlake, Redmond High additions have far exceeded the 2011 Levy

By Susan Wilkins

According to the school board's last consent agenda, which listed the contract amount for the STEM School, it occurred me that the total costs for the STEM School and the Eastlake and Redmond High School Additions have far exceeded the 2011 levy. The 3 school projects were to cost $65.6 million.  Read More >>

The construction contract for the STEM School was $24,080,000 (and the current construction amount is slightly lower.) However, that amount does not include the full cost of construction. The Six-Year Capital Facilities Plan 2012-2017 says that the STEM School total cost will be $26,175,677.

If we look at the Construction Contract for the Redmond High School Addition (also in the 2/11/2013 Board packet) we see that the contract amount was listed as $9,732,315. (The construction contract amount has since been increased to $10,178,257 because of extra costs.) When we look at Table 6 of the Six-Year Capital Facilities Plan 2012-2017, the Redmond High School Addition is listed as $19,092,507. The total cost of the RHS Addition includes both the construction cost and the non-construction cost including permitting fees and studies and construction management. Similarly, the Eastlake High School Addition is listed as $20,131,816. The construction contract for EHS is $10,645,700 and has since increased to $11,323,211.

To summarize:

RHS construction contract - $9,732,315; non-construction contract amount = $9,360,192

EHS construction contract - $10,645,700; non-construction contract amount = $9,486,116

STEM construction contract - $24,080,000; non-construction contract amount = $2,095,677

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Total construction contracts RHS, EHS, STEM = $44,458,015

Total non-construction contracts RHS, EHS, STEM = $20,941,985

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Total cost of RHS, EHS, STEM = $65,400,000

The problem that I see here is that the non-construction amount for the STEM School is only $2,000,000 while the non-construction amounts for RHS and EHS are both over $9,000,000. In the consent agendas that the Lake Washington School Board receives, the Change Orders that they routinely approve show the construction contract amount, but never show the total cost of each construction project. If the non-construction contract amount for the STEM School were more in line with those at RHS and EHS, then the construction cost for the STEM School should be at least $9,000,000 which puts the total cost of the EHS, RHS and STEM School at least $7,000,000 over budget. 

Additionally, when the School Board was asked to approve bonds for the construction of RHS & EHS at their May 21, 2012 meeting, they incurred interest debt of $4,000,000 to finance the bonds. So the RHS, EHS, STEM projects appear to be nearly $11,000,000 over budget.

I encourage the Lake Washington School Board to request a full accounting of costs associated with the construction of the STEM School and the Redmond and Eastlake High School Additions that were authorized by the February 2011 construction levy to determine if the projects are within budget.