THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1997, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, February 5, 1997 TAG: 9702050474
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: BY ANNE SAITA, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: CURRITUCK LENGTH: 65 lines
The general contractor for the new Currituck County high school, told last month it was being fired, is staying on the job.
The Board of Commissioners late Monday unanimously approved an agreement with Trafalgar House Construction Inc. The deal would beef up site management and accelerate the long-overdue completion of the $16 million building in Barco.
The building's co-owner, the Currituck County Board of Education, still must consent to the proposal before it can go into effect.
Mary Ellen Maxwell, chairwoman of the school board, said Tuesday that the board likely will meet this week to discuss the matter.
The board of education and commissioners voted Jan. 15 to terminate the contract with Trafalgar for failing to meet the promised deadline for a new high school.
The school, twice the size of the existing high school next door, was to open last September. It still has not opened.
School officials repeatedly complained that Trafalgar did not have enough people on the job and that work did not always meet specifications.
The company's president, Domenic Macaione of Tampa, Fla., has said that others, including both boards and three other contractors, must share blame for the delays.
Macaione also defended the workmanship of his company and said discrepancy values are nowhere near the half-million dollar figure cited by the county.
In any case, the new agreement should better ensure that taxpayers will receive a sound school, commissioners said Monday.
``This agreement is a much stronger agreement. It puts the county in a better position to ensure the completion of a quality high school,'' Commissioner Owen Etheridge said.
Among the conditions in the new agreement is the involvement of the surety, or bonding company.``We are considerably more comfortable with them being involved,'' said Skip Sanders, the school system's director of facilities and planning.
``It's nice to have them on board to help ride herd on these things,'' Sanders said Tuesday of the bonding company, American Home Assurance Company of New York.
In the agreement, Trafalgar will relieve project manager Ron Montecalvo and bring in operations manager John Cirone and engineer Marion Harris, both from the company's headquarters.
Sanders said the new agreement, if approved by the school board, will provide the county with more control of the project and more direction in correcting ``the matters that we found to be defective.''
Points of concern include wet walls from water leaks and adhesion problems with fireproofing, Sanders said.
Additionally there now will be a company special project superintendent to oversee quality assurance and another to deal with fire-proofing problems.
Trafalgar also agrees to increase its manpower and commit the resources to get the project done more quickly.
Sanders said Tuesday that he and the county's project manage, Staley Powell, have complained since last June that the manpower and work quality were slipping at the site.
Trafalgar said it will develop a ``critical path schedule'' to show how the pace will be speeded up.
Another important element, county officials said Monday, is a condition that American Home Assurance will not retain Trafalgar if the contractor defaults on the contract.
``This way we still have some say,'' said Commissioner Paul O'Neal, the chairman of the board.