Subject: Update about 'Pittsburgh Public Schools Board of Directors: Investigate if important information about Heads up!
- A renovation estimate from PPS is due tomorrow.
- However, the requirements of the Board resolution for the estimate have not been met.
- Specifically, Board members were to be provided with specifications and instructions for the estimate in advance of the estimate being done, so that any issues could be resolved before a figure was released.
- Despite numerous requests by Board members, specifications have not been provided.
- It is possible, then, that the estimate may include nonessential items like air conditioning, and that were there are various options for resolving an issue a more expensive option may be chosen. For example, the 2004 capital budget for ventilation upgrades was $1.35M; a later estimate for a different approach was $2.99M; but if the unprecedented approach of taking down all corridor walls is chosen the cost could be increased by $10M or more.
- Concerns about an inflated scope of service and therefore an inflated estimate are real because, incredibly, PPS officials and agents are still refusing to confirm that asbestos in the building plaster is minimal.
- Therefore, any estimate released by PPS should be taken as just a starting point subject to reduction when nonessential items are removed and less expensive options explored.
- The final step in any reasoned decision will be to compare the estimate for renovating Schenley to the renovation that Peabody will require, and to consider also the cost of making available to high school students at U Prep and Sci Tech athletic facilities comparable to those provided to other high school students in the district (cost of athletic facilities being approximately $20M).
- Until PPS does the right thing by Schenley we will not "just give up."
This message is from Concerned Citizens who started the petition "Pittsburgh Public Schools Board of Directors: Investigate if important information about Schenley was withheld at the time of closing ," which you signed on Change.org.
View the petition | View and reply to this message online
- A renovation estimate from PPS is due tomorrow.
- However, the requirements of the Board resolution for the estimate have not been met.
- Specifically, Board members were to be provided with specifications and instructions for the estimate in advance of the estimate being done, so that any issues could be resolved before a figure was released.
- Despite numerous requests by Board members, specifications have not been provided.
- It is possible, then, that the estimate may include nonessential items like air conditioning, and that were there are various options for resolving an issue a more expensive option may be chosen. For example, the 2004 capital budget for ventilation upgrades was $1.35M; a later estimate for a different approach was $2.99M; but if the unprecedented approach of taking down all corridor walls is chosen the cost could be increased by $10M or more.
- Concerns about an inflated scope of service and therefore an inflated estimate are real because, incredibly, PPS officials and agents are still refusing to confirm that asbestos in the building plaster is minimal.
- Therefore, any estimate released by PPS should be taken as just a starting point subject to reduction when nonessential items are removed and less expensive options explored.
- The final step in any reasoned decision will be to compare the estimate for renovating Schenley to the renovation that Peabody will require, and to consider also the cost of making available to high school students at U Prep and Sci Tech athletic facilities comparable to those provided to other high school students in the district (cost of athletic facilities being approximately $20M).
- Until PPS does the right thing by Schenley we will not "just give up."
This message is from Concerned Citizens who started the petition "Pittsburgh Public Schools Board of Directors: Investigate if important information about Schenley was withheld at the time of closing ," which you signed on Change.org.
View the petition | View and reply to this message online
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment