School building project $1.39 million over budget

At a Glencoe-Silver Lake School Board budget work session Monday night, Business Manager Michelle Sander announced a $1.39 million debt owed to Architects Rego Youngquist (ARY), Donlar Construction and subcontractors in relation to the school district’s recent building project.
In a slideshow presentation, Sander explained to the board members how such a large sum of money had not been accounted for. Donlar Construction, owed $86,000 from the school, was brought to the forefront immediately. Superintendent Chris Sonju and Sander attended multiple meetings in hopes of discussing budgetary matters and were relentless in getting updated budgets from Donlar, but the construction company said it couldn’t give updated budgets because of a lack of information from ARY. When Sander asked Donlar if it has gotten in contact with ARY, it said they haven’t been in communication.
The remaining $1.3 million can be attributed to additional soil corrections and state mandated bathroom renovations, fire suppression and water drainage. Another sizeable chunk comes from items accounted for using money from operating capital and long-term facilities maintenance (LTFM) funds.
About $125,000 is due to soil corrections from heavy rainfall. Back in the fall 2015, the Glencoe-Silver Lake (GSL) area saw three non-concurrent days of inordinate rainfall just after the soil was put down for construction. The rain decimated the soil, and even though the school took out insurance for instances like this, the insurance company saw the rainfall as three separate instances and only paid out $15,000.
For more, see the March 28 print edition of The Chronicle.