Local
school officials worry over building contract
freeze
Wednesday, April 13, 2005 • BY
STEVE CHAMBERS AND DUNSTAN McNICHOL • Star-Ledger
Staff
A month after New Jersey's inspector
general ordered a time-out while she investigated evidence
of waste in the state's $8.6 billion school construction
program, local officials are starting to complain that the
freeze is jeopardizing critical school projects.
Irvington, for instance, faces the
prospect of paying $400,000 to rent a Catholic school
building for an additional year because of delays in
starting an elementary school project there.
In Paterson and East Orange, hundreds of
children have been moved out of elementary schools to make
way for construction projects that have now been
delayed.
"The construction contract was supposed
to be awarded the day of the freeze," Paterson
Superintendent Dennis Clancy said. "Now I'm crowded all over
the district, and the building is sitting empty."
And in Gloucester, local officials are
concerned about dangers posed by 70 houses sitting empty and
boarded, awaiting demolition to make way for a new middle
school.
Union City and Gloucester administrators,
meanwhile, are concerned they will have no fields for the
fall football season unless the Schools Construction Corp.
is allowed to let work start on projects that were scheduled
to begin earlier this year.
"The purpose of having the inspector
general review the (SCC) is to be looking at ways of
reducing costs, not increasing them as appears to be the
case," said David Sciarra, the attorney for students in the
31 communities where the agency is building
schools.
Inspector General Mary Jane Cooper's
office declined to comment on the ongoing review.
Eric Shuffler, senior counselor to acting
Gov. Richard Codey, who ordered the review, said it would
not be prudent to start releasing new school contracts until
the inspector general can ensure they are structured in a
proper and cost-effective manner.
"We have two goals: One, to make sure the
inspector general gets to do a professional job, and two, to
make sure projects are not unnecessarily delayed," Shuffler
said. "And we don't think that's exclusive."
Codey ordered the review in February,
after a report in The Star-Ledger showed that schools built
by the SCC since 2002 have cost on average 45 percent more
than schools built by local school districts over the same
time.
On March 10, Cooper directed the SCC to
"refrain from completing and/or entering into any contracts,
change orders or any other commitments for purchases or
services" until her office can review the
contracts.
Cooper's order effectively stopped
pending SCC contracts in their tracks. At a hearing Monday,
Jack Spencer, the SCC's chief executive officer, told the
Legislature's Joint Committee on Public Schools that "a
couple of hundred million dollars" in contracts are awaiting
the green light.
In an interview yesterday, Spencer said
he expects to meet with Cooper this week to work out a
system for getting the contracts approved and under
way.
Spencer dismissed suggestions from local
officials that the delays might cause projects to be put off
until after the upcoming school year.
"We're working on this as quickly as
possible, and we really don't expect any delays," Spencer
said.
Kelley Heck, Codey's spokeswoman, said
the governor is confident that Cooper's oversight will not
harm the construction program.
"It's our understanding that the
inspector general is moving as fast as possible in her
review," she said.
Passaic Superintendent Robert Holster
said he is discouraged by the contract freeze and by what he
considers to be SCC bungling.
He said a May 4 groundbreaking is
scheduled for a $90 million, three-school complex on the
site of Beth Israel Hospital, which is empty and waiting to
be demolished. But he said the districtwide plan for eight
new schools is a year behind schedule.
"I am highly concerned and suspicious
over empty promises," he said. "We have identified all the
sites where we want to build and are acquiring land, but we
might wind up owning empty lots."
© 2005 The Star-Ledger. Used by NJ.com with
permission.
|