October 1st, 2015 by WCBC Radio
Engineers from Allegany County, the Board of Education and the project architect are meeting today with the five contractors who submitted bids for the new Allegany High School project in early September- with the goal being to find ways to make the project affordable. Preliminary estimates for the project hovered in the $42 million range, but all of the bids came in at or above $60 million. On Monday local officials met with the executive director of the Interagency Committee on School Construction- and it now appears there is no question that the project will have to be re-bid. There is a cost however, essentially what amounts to a penalty, as the re-bid will cost the county a million dollars. Sources have confirmed to WCBC News that although cut backs to the original scope of the project will be necessary, the consensus among education officials is that the lowest cost to build a representative high school will be in the area of $55 million. In addition, the state is setting a cap of $36 million- leaving the county to come up with an estimated $20 million. Making matters worse, the re-bid means the original funding commitment will be rescinded- and that moves the funding formula out of the 93-7 state/county split window- reducing it to 83/17. Although not using the term “Taj Mahal”- Commissioner Bill Valentine says the plans for the new Allegany easily exceed what is necessary for a high school, and it should be easy to scale back the design
