Contracts awarded for school renovations
$25.2M awarded to two contractors for work at four schools
BY LAYLI WHYTE
Staff Writer

EATONTOWN - Bids have been submitted and contracts awarded so the renovation work on all four of the borough's public schools can now begin.

Contracts were awarded at Monday's special meeting of the Eatontown Board of Education to two contractors for work on two schools.

Lighton Industries, Lakewood, was awarded a contract for the renovation work planned for the K-6 Meadowbrook and Woodmere schools for a total of $12.2 million..

The contract for renovation work for the K-6 Margaret L. Vetter School and the grades 7-8 Memorial School was awarded to The Bennett Co., Passaic, for a total of $13 million.

The bids were, overall, under budget, according to Brooks Garrison, Garrison Architects, Mount Laurel, the project architectural firm, who spoke at Monday's meeting.

Garrison said that residents of Eatontown should be very pleased, because the referendum process for this project began in 2005, and the application to the state Department of Education was submitted in June 2005, including cost estimates for the work.

"Who bought gas in 2005 for what they bought gas for tonight?" he asked. "We were able to award these contracts tonight for prices that we came up with in June 2005. Over the course of a year and a half, prices have gone up and down."

The total amount approved in the referendum, by about 80 votes, is $29.8 million.

Garrison explained that the project was put out to bid as two separate contracts, with two schools in each bid request.

"The people of Eatontown should be happy with these bids," he said. "The bid strategy seemed to have worked out."

Garrison said that a preconstruction meeting is planned for next week, and the entire project is, as of now, on time and under budget, leaving a $1 million contingency fund that will likely be used to pay for some alternative improvements to the schools.

He said that the contractors will hold the prices for the alternates for 60 days from the time the contracts were awarded.

Board attorney Dennis Collins said the $1 million contingency fund is about 5 percent of the entire budget, and there are 14 alternative improvements that the board can consider as the project moves forward.

Before the board could vote to award the contracts, however, the board first had to vote to transfer funds from the projects for Margaret L. Vetter School and Memorial School to the budgets for Meadowbrook and Woodmere schools.

Board member George Marcoullier said that the bids for Vetter and Memorial schools came in significantly under budget, and that the bids for Meadowbrook and Woodmere schools also came in under budget.

He said the transfer of funds would not change the amount of work done in any of the schools, or change the amount of funding that was approved in the referendum in March 2006.

"We were looking at about $600,000 per school," he said. "The budget estimates came in extremely well placed."

Board member Fred Naimoli said the differences in cost between the time of the referendum and the time of the bids coming in were simply the result of price fluctuations that took place during that time.

"Things like fuel, for instance," he said, "has had its price go up and down wildly over the past 18 months. It's still net up, but not as net up as it was six months ago. The price of plywood was the same as gold in some places, but now the price of plywood is down. We prepared ourselves, so we have sufficient funds for the entire project."

The work planned for the schools includes the replacement of roofs, doors and windows and upgrades to heating and electrical systems at all four schools.

Upgrades are also planned for interior and exterior lighting at all four schools as well as upgrades to restrooms, doorways, water fountains and common areas in order to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Memorial School, originally designed as an elementary school in the 1950s, will receive the bulk of the renovations, including new recessed lockers to replace the stand-alone lockers currently lining its hallways.