LYNNWOOD, Wash., March 14, 2023—The Lynnwood City Council approved a $677,453 change order for the Community Justice Center (CJC) during their meeting on March 13. Six council members voted in favor of the change order, with Councilmember Joshua Binda abstaining.
The change order covers unforeseen costs and design errors and omissions discovered as construction has progressed on the CJC.
“This is a very important project. No one likes increases, but unfortunately this is the way it is for small and large projects all over… because of the different supply issues,” Council President Shannon Sessions said. “So unfortunately, this is something that we’re having to deal with, but we do need to get this finished.”
Previous change orders totaled around $4.4 million, which have — including the change order passed on the 13th — increased the original contract amount of about $56.4 million to $61.6 million. This is still within the $64 million the city estimated at the start of the project.
“Design teams miss things,” Lynnwood Police Department Deputy Chief Chuck Steichen said during the council work session on March 6. “Their general industry, when it comes to what’s referred to as errors and omissions for design, they usually average around 5% of the overall project cost, you know, essentially for misses that the design team doesn’t catch. And I can tell you right now, at this point in time on this project, we are just over 2% — I want to say 2.7%.”
RELATED INFORMATION: LYNNWOOD COMMUNITY JUSTICE CENTER PROJECT
While the CJC project, according to Steichen, is currently below the industry average for design errors and omissions, Councilmember George Hurst expressed frustration over the design oversights.
“I’m not quite sure why we have to pay for their error,” Hurst said. “I’m sure they have an errors and omissions clause, so….”
The largest of these design errors and omissions is a $293,459 revision to the fire safety system which Steichen, who is also the project manager, referred to as a “smoke evacuation system.”
“After initial design of the facility, once they got into contractor design of the site, they identified there wasn’t enough airflow movement in case of a fire in the jail,” Steichen said. “So they had to retrofit the roofing system so that a number of the existing light passthroughs — the skylights systems — are actually ventable. So in case of a fire alarm or a fire or smoke event inside the jail, many of the panels on the roof will open up and allow air to evacuate out of the area.”
The second largest is a $234,484 improvement to the onsite stormwater collection vault. According to Steichen, a “seamless” waterproofing system placed inside the initially designed concrete vault walls — expected to last an estimated 50 years — “would extend the life significantly.”
Councilmember Patrick Decker commented that the additional waterproofing was an unnecessary additional cost, but stated he was unwilling to hold up approval for its removal.
One of the unforeseen costs incurred was the result of varying asphalt thickness on 194th street SW. The initial bid estimated that 6” of asphalt would have to be removed to place down utilities, however, the asphalt was over 12” in some areas. The additional work this required added $181,403.
Finally, the last addition to the change order involved upgrading the glass framing in two large areas of the facility for fire safety, costing $110,542.
There was a deduction included within the change order: the removal of a $142,435 temporary roof that was determined to be unnecessary.
OTHER BUSINESS
The Council proclaims the month of March as Women’s History Month.
Author: George Ftikas Jr.
