MLSD awards construction contract

MOSES LAKE — The Moses Lake School District on Thursday awarded the first construction contract related to the district’s new high school — informally referred to as Real World Academy.

At an online meeting on Thursday, the Moses Lake School Board in a 4-1 vote approved a $676,000 contract with Moses Lake-based North Central Construction Inc., for site preparation work on the roughly 32-acre campus. The district is preparing to begin design and construction on the new campus in earnest next year.

The contract amount was much lower than the original estimate for site preparation of $1.6 million, according to Superintendent Josh Meek.

“Our estimate missed the mark in a good way,” Meek said. “It’s a wonderful position to be in.”

However, board member Elliott Goodrich expressed concerns that if NAC Architecture, the firm that is designing the new high school and crafted the cost estimates for construction work, got the cost estimate on the site preparation wrong, it might get other construction costs wrong as well.

“Why do you think this is so far off? That was substantially wrong,” Goodrich said. “I don’t want to get any negative surprises when the whole (construction) package goes out.”

Meek said the cost is lower because MLSD bid the work separately at a time when many contractors are looking for work. Typically, site preparation is bid out as part of the whole package, Meek said.

The entire Real World Academy project is estimated to cost the MLSD around $68 million. The 900-student school, which will focus on career and technical education, will sit between the current Moses Lake High School and the Columbia Basin Technical Skills Center.

The district is also currently evaluating suggestions for the school’s proper name.

If splitting the site preparation work from the rest of the contract saved the school district nearly $1 million, Goodrich wondered if it would be possible to break off more from the general construction contract when it is awarded next spring.

“Are the other things we can break off?” he asked.

Meek said that while that might be a good idea, there’s a limit to the number of companies that can successfully bid for a project as large as the construction of a $68 million high school. However, the district will keep close tabs as the contract is let out to bid next spring just in case something was missed.

Board member Bryce McPartland, who ran in support of the original proposal approved by voters in 2017 to build a second, 1,600-student high school, voted against approving the contract.

Charles H. Featherstone can be reached at [email protected].