By Adam Swift
It was predominately good news during the most recent meeting of the Revere High School Building Committee late last month.
The latest cost projections for the project have it coming in at between $8 to $10 million below the $493.2 million budget for the new four-story high school at the Wonderland site, according to Brian Dakin of owner’s project manager LeftField.
The building committee also voted to approve sending the 60 percent complete construction documents to the Massachusetts School Building Authority, which is slated to pay for approximately $234 million of the project through a grant.
The building committee had previously agreed to cut $10 million from the project budget citing some financial concerns from the city. If the current estimates hold, Dakin said the design team will not have to perform any value engineering to potentially make cuts to the project.
“We’re still dealing with estimated numbers, and we are going to be primed as these estimated numbers turn into bid numbers to either be on the good side of things and achieve that $10 million goal before we are done bidding, or be in the position to value engineer the project to fit within the $10 million reduced budget,” said Dakin. “Right now, with these estimates, no (value engineering) action is necessary, and as we make the transition into hard numbers, the topic could come up later, but some of us are at least crossing our fingers that the bidding process as a net result will exceed the $10 million goal.”
The bulk of the project will likely be bid out in the fall and winter with the potential to secure a GMP (guaranteed maximum price) contract with all of the bids included by next March.
Dakin also said the project timeline also has the building ready for occupancy for the 2028-29 school year.
“This is the critical part of the schedule, getting from the end of permitting into bidding and real construction,” said Dakin. “We certainly have a lot of attention on that with the team; we are still making the end deadline and our estimates are a little budget here.”
Superintendent of Schools Dr. Dianne Kelly did raise some concerns about the project schedule and a tight window for occupying the new high school once construction is substantially complete.
“Although we are holding the start of the 28-29 school year as the opening for the new school, we have slipped about a month of when we anticipate to be finished from June of 2028 to July of 2028,” said Kelly. “We haven’t started the work yet, so that’s a real worry for me from the school side. I just want to say that out loud now so that we all can be doing … everything we can to make up that month that we have already lost.”
Kelly said the school needs that summer to transition several hundred staff members into the new building.
“I just want to make sure that I say now that an August building ready is different than a June building ready,” said Kelly.
Other than clearing all the permitting, Dakin said there is no higher priority for the project team than to keep the schedule moving forward on time.
“It has crunched a bit right now and we’ll do everything we can to recover that and get a little bit more clearance between substantial completion and the movement,” said Dakin.
In other business, representatives from project architect Perkins Eastman reviewed the latest updates in the design plans for the high school. The biggest proposed changes revolved around some of the materials used near the entrances to the school.
There was also discussion about the potential placement of the old Wonderland sign at the new high school, with the consideration of placing it on one of the athletic outbuildings so that it would face the street.
