North Egypt News

Missing bolts during the construction of walls for the new Mount Vernon Police Department are a mistake that is forcing the City to dip into the project's contingency budget.

Jacob Sanabia, the project manager for Holland Construction, told the Mount Vernon City Council that a masonry contractor skipped part of the process because he had never seen it before in his career—which is why the $17,000 change order was needed.

"It was a mistake," Sanabia said during the Jan. 3 meeting. "And I wish it wouldn't have happened. And I wish construction always went perfect, 100% as planned, but it doesn't unfortunately. That's why we have contingency dollars built into projects, because it's kind of known that even though no one wants it to happen, and we try, you know, as much as we can to have it not happen, mistakes do happen."

Sanabia gave the council a progress report on the site and provided pictures to show the work completed in the past month, which included finishing the interior load-bearing walls, the walls around the physical fitness center and the dispatch area, the electrical fire protection aspects, work on the roof deck, and the structural framing of the whole building.

There is no scheduled site work this month, but structural work will continue on the metal walls and other interior walls within the structure, along with most of the steel work. Six days of site work were lost in December due to the weather.

Sanabia also discussed some of the charges with both the City’s contingency fund and allowances fund. The contingency fund is the fund put into the contract for any unexpected and unavoidable price increases, supplies or delays. The allowances fund is for possible needs and goes back to the City if not used.