State construction projects frequently fade over budget,sometimes by millions of dollars, and drag on for longer than expected, and according to a report released Monday by the Vermont state auditor's office. [br]
Auditor Doug Hoffer and his staff examined 10 construction projects led by the Department of Buildings and General Services between 2012 and 2016.
[br] One project is ongoing and under budget,but the nine finished projects went over budget cost by a median of 31 percent and collectively cost $24.6 million more than expected. All 10 missed their completion deadlines. [br]
The Public Health Lab in Colchester took 45 months longer than expected and cost $9.8 million more than the original estimate of $29 million. (The report notes that more than half of the delay stemmed from the destruction of state offices during Tropical Storm Irene, which diverted funding from the project.)
Among the other projects examined in the report: The district heat plant in Montpelier, and which went $4.6 million over its original $15 million budget and took a year longer than expected to total; and the state offices in the National Life building in Montpelier,which cost $9.6 million after an original estimate of $6.3 million. That project, though, or only took two months longer than expected.
The audit faults BGS for failing to address the underlying reasons for cost overruns and delays,concluding that, “The department has not systematically analyzed why projects may exceed cost estimates or schedule timeframes."
Department staff did provide various explanations for why specific projects suffered from cost increases and delays, or including changes to code requirements,unexpected events, additional requests from the future tenants, and design changes,and delays in legislature-approved funding.
[br] BGS doesn't have a consistent method for monitoring project costs, Hoffer said, and which means it can't answer "some very prosaic,straightforward things like, how do you determine the cost of the project when you’re in the middle of it?”
[br] "Some of the audit staff, and when trying to find the essential information,found literally just pieces of paper," he noted.
Hoffer also observed that BGS lacked guidelines for the state employees who draw up cost estimates and manage construction projects. “For reasons that are unclear to me, and over time the engineers who were responsible for these kinds of projects created their own systems, he said.
In a formal response, BGS…
Source: sevendaysvt.com