DOR grants waiver of Prop. 2½; Contractors anticipate final figure in early Sept.

On Monday Tisbury officials got word from the Massachusetts Department of Revenue (DOR) that they will not need to hold a special election for the $26 million request for school project funding. DOR approved an exemption from the provisions of a Proposition 2½ debt exclusion, which typically requires both a town meeting vote and a ballot endorsement. 

The town and its architect made the case that the project is essentially the same one voters approved at $55 million on June 22, 2021, but inflation and supply chain issues have driven up the cost. 

The town could still put the additional funding to a ballot vote, but doesn’t have to, Deborah Wagner, director of accounts for the DOR, wrote in a letter to the town . “Alternatively, the select board can decline to call a special election and move directly to a new bond authorization, which is required via a two-thirds vote of town meeting in order to cover the additional costs,” Wagner wrote.

The select board has a meeting scheduled for Wednesday.

Meanwhile, the Guaranteed Maximum Price (GMP), a contractual final figure between the Tisbury School project’s construction manager at risk and the Town of Tisbury, isn’t expected to be more than the $26 million in additional borrowing voters will be asked to consider at the Sept. 20 special town meeting. That’s the position taken by W.T Rich representatives Tuesday afternoon at a Tisbury School Building Committee meeting. 

The GMP has been a moving target with the contractor first saying it would be available in July, then August, and now pushing it into early September just weeks ahead of the special town meeting scheduled for the project.

When the construction team was asked by The Times what recourse there might be if the GMP exceeded the $26 million placed on the warrant, W.T. Rich project manager Evan Moore said, “We don’t anticipate that happening at this point.”

Tisbury voters have already approved $55 million for a school renovation and addition project. That sum was previously touted by both school and town officials as being sufficient to fund the project. However, as The Times reported in July , the cost of finishing the project has ballooned another $26 million. Both W.T Rich and owner’s project manager CHA Consulting have pointed to inflation in materials, labor challenges, and supply chain issues as drivers in the cost increase. 

As an example of how costly materials are, especially on the Vineyard, W.T. Rich CEO Jonathan Rich said concrete costs about 80 percent more on-Island than it does off-Island. 

Rich said he believed concrete on the Vineyard cost in the low to mid $200 range per cubic yard whereas off-island he estimated it at $130 to $140 per cubic yard. 

Despite materials and labor challenges, Rich said his firm has been “deliberately conservative” in its calculations and feels “confident” the GMP won’t exceed $26 million. 

Despite inflationary pressures on the project Moore told the committee that they were still able to realize about $1 million in cost savings through the “descoping” process. Building committee chair Michael Watts later told The Times the approximate figure was an aggregation of descoping work in many areas and that descoping itself was part haggling and part meticulous verification of bid aspects.

In a March Tisbury School Building Committee meeting , W.T. Rich project manager Harvey Heskenas described the GMP as “the price that we will do the job for,” a figure that “we will not exceed that based on all the bid documents that we’ve been provided.”  

Watts later told The Times that essentially not even the GMP is absolutely set in stone.

“There’s always the possibility that some unforeseen item crops up,” Watts said. He noted the Tisbury School was an old structure and “there’s always a chance for a surprise.” However, he echoed what Rich had said, that a hedge against such possible surprises is built into the $26 million figure. 

When asked when the GMP was expected, Moore said, “We’re anticipating early September — to have a draft to the town right after Labor Day.”

Previously, the GMP was anticipated in July and when the $26 million figure was announced, officials said they expected the GMP by mid-August.

Despite not having reached an agreement on a GMP and the vote on additional funding a month away, W.T. Rich has already begun demolition on the school gym. 

“We did start the MEP (mechanical, electrical, and plumbing) separation from the existing school building,” Moore said. “We have not separated the building from the existing school building. And we’ve commenced with some interior select demolition ahead of the structural demolition of the wing.”

In the next 30 days, Moore said W.T. Rich plans to continue with “select demolition.” 

Debris from demolition work last week will be deposited in dumpsters, Moore said. 

“The intent was to remove all of the combustibles and then disconnect the fire suppression system,” Moore said. However a decision was made to keep the sprinkler system “alive” for now, he said. 

Moore also said it was discovered that the gym isn’t on a slab, as previously thought, but on wooden joists connected to cement piers.

Watts later told The Times all demolition done in the gym thus far can be undone, if need be, depending on how the town meeting vote goes.

“It’s totally recoverable, at least from what I’ve been told,” he said.

At the meeting Watts described the GMP as a “shifting target” and asked for an explanation as to why. 

Moore responded in part by saying  “Trying to get bidders on the Island has been very very difficult for this scope of work, for this magnitude of work.”

Watts further asked how many “folks on-Island have been a component of the project?”

“So as of right now,” Moore said, “we’ve only got the plumber on board for the temporary modulars. I’ve started the outreach process with landscaping. We’ve had a very very difficult time getting landscape numbers. It is a fairly large scope of wok … you get one bid and it’s incredibly high so our job is to go back out and try to find additional bidders, vet those numbers and again get the best price for the town. But as far as Island contractors we’ve also reached out to a few acoustical installation contractors on the Island but we have not finalized any other contracts except for AP Fortes Plumbing.”

The “modulars,” temporary classrooms that W.T. Rich has put together from modular building sections that were barged to the Vineyard, will serve as an alternate school setting while the school is gutted, rebuilt, and added onto. 

Mike Owen, a project manager for CHA Consulting, said he expects the move into the temporary school to happen in November. 

Watts also told The Times a more specific date in November wasn’t available yet.

“It will be a moving target depending on how the subcontractors do their part,” he said. 

Watts expects water and sewer to be finished “well in advance” but did not say the same for electrical work or fire systems. 

Owen said that it will be “a considerable upgrade to bring the primary feeder cables to the school for both temporary campus and permanent ultimate power for the new building.” Eversource is at work on engineering and final numbers on the work, Owen said. Owen expected the work to be “quite costly.”

Watts later said the temporary school will be 100 percent electric. He was unsure if the existing backup generator at the school will be used for the temporary school or if another generator will be installed. 

Should voters reject the $26 million request at special town meeting the modulars represent the plan B of the school committee, as chair Amy Houghton pointed out in the last school committee meeting. The modulars cost $85,000 per month. However, that cost was something Houghton found more acceptable than the idea of having to return students and staff to the old school as is. She described the building as too full of hazardous materials to be reinhabited in the wake of a no vote. 

“We realize this is a terrible position that we’re in,” she said at the time. “It’s a terrible position that the town is in.” 

Regardless of the pollution in the school, which Houghton previously described as lead-tainted water, black mold, lead paint, and asbestos, students are currently on track to be placed inside the building at the start of the school year on Sept. 6 and are slated to stay there until the temporary school can be occupied. 

When later asked what the Tisbury School Building Committee’s plan B was and what the fate of the temporary school might be should voters reject the $26 million, Watts said a plan B was outside the scope of his committee. 

Watts clarified the committee was charged with oversight of a specific school project. 

“If you vote no, you need another project,” he said. “I know that’s not going to be popular with a lot of people but that’s literally how the committee works.”

If the authorities choose not to have a vote on the 26mm it would be a huge article of bad faith. They would be hiding behind a technicality in the law and would deny a democratic process.

I agree with you entirely…This is a strange feeling.

To proceed without having a vote because they have discovered they technically can avoid doing so is beyond inexcusable.

If only our Summer residents would register to vote on Island we would not have theses Libs wasting our hard earned tax dollars on education facilities.

If the authorities do not allow a vote on the 26mm it would be a colossal show of bad faith

I guess your opinion didn’t change in half an hour. Will we get an update tomorrow?

I actually think Engelmans opinion did change. It went from huge to colossal. That’s significant. And in my opinion he Is minimizing it. Thanks.

Bill– sometimes, my comment that is waiting review disappears and I think it is moderated out or perhaps I didn’t hit “post comment”, so I try again. My guess is that is what happened in this case with andy. Like a typo, mistakes happen. I agree with andy on this one.

Let get this done Tisbury. Show up to the meeting and vote yes!

For the sake of our children, I recommend a NO vote on Sept. 20. And if They don’t allow us to vote, or choose to over-ride our NO votes, then we have some serious work to do to stand up for our Democracy Rights. And we’ll bring our little forks, the smaller the better – the big ones were only needed for the opening act, to begin the tear-down of this harmful business-as-usual wall.

Mr Brown I posted the first and it didnt appear to ”take”. May a small accident go without criticism? The important issue is that Tisbury may scuttle the vote.

True Conservatives do not make mistakes. They don’t even remove important papers from the office.

There is indeed a Plan B – and it does not entail our children staying in trailers costing $85,000 a month. Stay tuned for my upcoming tell-all YouTube channel, where I will show you the school we can have instead, and I invite everyone to help make it the best school design we can imagine, to cost half as much as the Tappe design, and be ready in half the time. I kid you not. I have asked about the air quality in those trailers – they are pretty much all plastic, and if it’s true that they out-gas harmful substances, then our children will be breathing them in. I have not yet received an answer to my inquiry. Have they even asked the trailer company that question?

Select board considering these issues at 4PM today. Please attend via zoom Meeting ID 836 9947 7566 Passcode: 049698

I am a parent to a Tisbury school parent to a incoming Kindergartner and a sixth-grader and a science teacher at MVRHS. Please do not continue to talk about about bringing weapons of any size to a school. As adults we need to learn to disagree without violence or threats, our children are watching. I am sorry you did not feel your ideas were accounted for and you do not like this school design. I attended many of the early meetings on this including ones where your ideas were shared. I think anyone with questions about this process should begin to dig deep into understanding Massachusetts design, bidding and procurement regulations.

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