North Penn School District could be spending more than $25,000 extra on construction at Knapp Elementary, thanks to two unrelated issues with PECO.
The first regards installation of stormwater pipes as part of the addition and renovation project at Knapp Elementary School on Knapp Road in Lansdale. Project construction manager Bill Slawter said at Monday’s meeting of the district’s Facilities and Operations Committee, that in the process of installing the stormwater pipes, they had come across gas lines
"The drawings that the design professionals were provided by PECO were inaccurate as to the exact location of the gas line,” Slawter said. "We did contact PECO about it and they had stated that they would have to charge us to lower the gas line, so we felt it was much more cost effective to do it with the contractor on site.”
Slawter said to fix the problem, the contractor "underdug” the gas line, let it sag low enough to install the stormwater pipe across the gas line, then backfilled it. PECO oversaw the work to ensure there would be no disruption to the gas line or safety issues.
The cost for this work was an additional $7,740.43.
The second was a change request by the electrical contractors working at Knapp. During the coordination study, the engineers used the PECO "blue book for design,” and their calculations utilized a 750-kilowatt transformer in the design. However, PECO no longer supplies that transformer, and has derated the transformer to a 500-kilowatt transformer.
"We reached out to PECO about this to try and get some assistance, and because they don’t utilize that transformer any longer, we have to go to the 500kw transformer,” Slawter said.
As a result, on the switchgear, they’ll have to increase the size of incoming breakers to 100KAIC to handle the additional load, in the event of an excessive power surge.
This upgrade’s cost: an additional $17,301.75.
Several committee members took exception to these additional expenses. "This school district should not be paying the $17,000,” said Facilities and Operations Committee member Cathy Wesley.
"I’m surprised that that type of change… we’re assuming this cost because of PECO’s lack of responsiveness, I suppose,” said committee chair Jonathan Kassa.
Wesley directed NPSD chief financial officer Steve Skrocki to attempt to recoup the funds for these additional expenses from PECO.
"So there’s two jobs here, one with PECO where their drawings that they provided us were incorrect… and now this one,” Wesley said. "Mr. Skrocki, is there any way to talk to PECO about making us whole on this? Because it’s two errors they made that this district is now incurring additional costs on projects.”
Skrocki said he would reach out but doubted whether his efforts would be effective.
"We can certainly talk to them. I don’t expect any deviation from what’s being presented tonight,” Skrocki said. "Quite frankly they hold the hammer here.”
Kassa added that perhaps the district could also turn to elected officials for their support in getting PECO to rectify these issues. "I’m wondering if someone like Rep. (Steve) Malagari or Rep. (Liz) Hanbridge would be able to at least help us if PECO is non-responsive,” Kassa said.
"We’ll start with PECO and we’ll see where that takes us,” Skrocki said.
The Knapp Elementary construction project will address "capacity issues, outdated mechanical, electrical and plumbing systems and a variety of other concerns,” according to an Act 34 Hearing Presentation by SchraderGroup to the district in January. The school has been functioning at 120% of capacity.
Construction costs were estimated at $28 million to bring Knapp up to current standards, including expansion to accommodate increased capacity, and renovations to upgrade building systems and improve life safety and code, security, air quality, and efficiency.
The construction, which the district anticipates will take several years to complete, began in June.
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