New Canaan High School roofing project ‘substantially complete’ — solar work up next
NEW CANAAN — The $3 million bonded roofing project at the high school is “substantially complete,” according to school district’s Director of Finance and Operations Jo-Ann Keating, and is expected to come in under budget.
The project, which was initially slated to be worked on over the course of two years, is nearing completion, Keating told First Selectman Kevin Moynihan and others Monday.
Time estimates were not the only aspect of the project that came in better than expected, though.
“Right now we do expect to come within, probably, below our $3 million budget that we have for the project,” Keating said.
One aspect in keeping the overall cost of the project down was the ability to order the full range of materials needed for the project before nationwide supply shortages due to the coronavirus pandemic. Keating said the ability to have the materials in hand prior to delays from shortages “helped us” price-wise.
Daniel Clarke, New Canaan Public Schools’ director of facilities operations, agreed.
He cited conversations with roofing contractors that said there have been “a lot of other roofing projects” that have not yet been able to kick off because of shortage of materials.
The high school roofing project comes after the two projects done at the East School and South School. One obstacle that the most recent project has had to overcome is inclement weather. “The rain has not been helpful this year,” Keating said.
“Like the last two projects that we had at East and South,” Keating explained, “we were able to complete them prior to the start of this school.”
The current project is roughly three weeks from being fully completed, however, it was delayed by 17 days due to rain, according to Clarke.
“So we are still working at the high school,” Keating said. “There has been significant progress in fact, we are what we would call ‘substantially complete’ with the exception of a few roofs that need to be completed.”
The roofing project as a whole called for 28 different roofing surfaces to replaced. As of this week, just four are left, including the roof over the boiler room that is currently being worked on.
Clarke said the next area to be redone is over the music and art classrooms. The last roofing surface to be completed will be the auditorium’s.
Thus far, the district has been “quite pleased” with the work, according to Clarke.
“Despite the weather,” Keating said, the project is set to very succesful.
The next step is to start placing the bids on solar panels.
“There is a lot of real estate” on the roof for solar, Keating said. Any portion of the roof that is currently finished and isn’t inhabited by other mechanical hardware is eligible to have solar panels installed.
The West School has already had all of its solar panels installed as of last week, while Saxe Middle School is nearing its competion of solar panel installations.
Other areas of town, such as Waveny Care Center, have solar projects underway.
Current estimates suggest that Combined Heat and Power installations will produce 61 percent of the electric load and save an estimate of over $39,000 for New Canaan Town Hall, as well as produce 140 percent of the electric load for Lapham Community Center and save roughly $25,000 for the town there.