Penfield Reopening Now 8+ Weeks Behind Schedule

Reconstruction of Penfield Pavilion is now more than eights weeks behind schedule and it appears unlikely to the building committee's chairman that a new pavilion will be built before the end of next summer.

"We're aware we're some eight-plus weeks behind," Town Public Works Director Richard White said to members of the Penfield Pavilion Building Committee at a meeting this week in Sullivan-Independence Hall.

James Gallagher, the committee's chairman, said, "This won't be ready, by my own estimate, before the end of September."

The reconstruction of the center and westerly wings of the Fairfield Beach Road pavilion also is running slightly over budget, according to a document that White gave the committee Monday night.

The largest section of the $3.28 million project that's overbudget so far is in overtime for DPW workers, who have been struggling to make up for time lost due to significant snowstorms this winter that diverted them from the pavilion project onto snowplows and snow shovels and the need to overexcavate the site due to peat underneath the old structure. The budget envisioned $7,000 worth of overtime for DPW workers, while the total amount of overtime accrued as of Monday totaled $30,000. White forecast a total of $40,000 in overtime for DPW workers before the project is finished.

The DPW's part of the job was to demolish the center and westerly sections, remove the rubble and build foundations for new center and westerly sections. A. Secondino & Son, Inc. of Branford was then to take over and build the new sections.

As of Monday, White was projecting that the project would end $20,000 overbudget, but that analysis assumes A. Secondino & Son doesn't go over its $2.534 million base bid. The projection also incorporates cost savings in other parts of the budget, the most significant of which is $61,900 by cutting two of three add alternates (wave pattern on deck, lifeguard stations) and $31,523 in disposal of general demolition material ($66,000 budget vs. $34,477 actual.)

Town officials said the building committee is trying to get an outdoor deck, restrooms and concession stand opened in early July, and Gallagher said A. Secondino & Son had offered to work two shifts. Gallagher said the committee planned to talk to neighbors to see if that would be a problem.

"The decision on the overtime and how we spend the money is entirely up to this committee. The longer the opening date gets pushed back, the more money we lose on the concession," Gallagher said. "Hopefully, within two weeks, everyone will start getting excited because the skeleton of this building will start taking shape."