First high school bid is below estimate

Last updated 5/14/2002 at Noon

The first bid for work on the new Sisters High School came in $111,658 below the contractor's estimate.

Elting, Inc. of Gladstone, Oregon, bid $367,900 for mass excavation and grading at the school site. The contractor's estimate for that work was $479,558.

The low bid amount is good news to the school district, because the school board had to cut $500,000 worth of features from the school plan to keep within its $21 million budget.

Savings from low bids could allow the board to restore cut features. It won't be clear how much can be restored until the project is completely bid out.

In other business, the school board rejected an environmental construction certification program that would have cost the district some $387,000.

The LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) program aims for energy efficient construction and lower impact on the environment through the use of locally produced and recycled materials.

Participating in LEED would have cost at least $82,000 to meet documentation requirements.

Additional "Silver" certification would have required some $305,000 in additional construction costs, mostly associated with changes in the HVAC system.

The program might have offset expenses with long-term energy savings and $320,000 from tax credits if the school was awarded federal "Silver" certification.

However, architect Scott Steele could not guarantee that level of certification.

Steele and his colleague Mike Gorman acknowledged that the current design already incorporates many of the important aspects of LEED.

The building uses locally produced materials for the exterior walls.

According to Steele, the existing design is 21 percent more energy efficient than code requires (a $40,000 savings per year).

LEED enhancements would have increased energy efficiency by another 5 percent (an $8,500 savings per year).

The expense was not included in any budgeting for the project and would have had to come from further cuts or from contingency funds.

The board was unwilling to risk the money, especially since it had made cuts to the scope of the school to stay within budget.

The board voted unanimously not to seek LEED certification.

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Jim Cornelius, Editor in Chief

Jim Cornelius is editor in chief of The Nugget and author of “Warriors of the Wildlands: True Tales of the Frontier Partisans.” A history buff, he explores frontier history across three centuries and several continents on his podcast, The Frontier Partisans. For more information visit www.frontierpartisans.com.