Falmouth High project will need extra $18.8M

An ongoing project to renovate and expand Falmouth High School is now expected to cost $18.8 million more than its original $67 million price tag.

At its Feb. 7 meeting, the Falmouth High School Building Committee made the announcement after what it called many meetings and many hours of discussion.

"The subcommittee has considered input from the architects, the project manager, the general contractor, the town manager, the chairman of the selectman's finance committee, the school committee and our administration," said Donald Johnson, the committee's chairman.

While residents have known about cost overruns and the need for an additional funds request at April's Town Meeting, a hard number has not been presented until now.

"This amount reflects the total project and includes what we need for construction, architects, legal, furniture, technology, project manager and several other minor classifications," said Johnson.

Peter Clark, a committee member and former Falmouth schools superintendent, added that it would be ineffective to project a number that ultimately wouldn't cover costs.

"When you're creating a number of this sort, you need to look at worst-case kinds of situations," Clark said. "It's certainly, I'm sure, as it was for us, a staggering kind of proposition, but it does reflect our efforts to predict what is going to be needed given the history of this project."

Robert Antonucci, a fellow committee member and also a former Falmouth schools superintendent, made a motion that the building committee include the $18.8 million request at April's Town Meeting. The motion was unanimously approved.

Falmouth has already authorized roughly $67 million for the project, which began construction in the spring of 2005. The project has experienced a number of delays, not the least of which has been an ongoing lawsuit filed by ARCADD, the West-Newton based architectural firm which was fired by the town in early 2006 and replaced with Boston-based DiNisco Design Partnership.

To date, there have also been more than $5 million in change orders on the project. One change order alone, which addressed the needs of a sewer line, accounted for roughly $1 million of that figure. Other issues have included the removal of asbestos and the need to redesign an exterior wall.

The original completion date for the project was December of last year but delays have pushed that back to a target date of summer 2009.

Any additional funds must be approved by Town Meeting in April but do not necessarily have to go before voters in the spring election. At their Feb. 4 meeting, Falmouth selectmen were told by Falmouth Town Manager Robert Whritenour that the board has the option to apply to the Massachusetts Department of Revenue for permission to include any additional funds within the scope of the original debt exclusion.

Selectmen listened to Whritenour's explanation but did not decide upon a course of action.

"It's still up to the Board of Selectmen to put this on the ballot or not," said Selectmen Chairman Kevin Murphy that night.

The next meeting of the building committee will be held Friday, Feb. 15 at 8 a.m. at the School Administration Building, 340 Teaticket Highway.

The Falmouth Bulletin's Craig Salters contributed to this article.