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Springs School
Changes to the new playground and a recently-installed phone system are going to cost the Springs School District an extra $20,000, and Board of Education members are not happy about it.
At a meeting on Monday night, October 4, the change orders were approved by 3-2 votes to fork over $9,284.67 to American Recreational Products for removal of playground equipment and resurfacing, and $9,980.25 to Forerunner Technologies, Inc. for upgraded models of phones.
Administrators and board members discussed the immediate need to take care of the safety issues, but still, trustees Dave Conlon and Pat Brabant said the district should not be forced to pay up front for the mistakes of others.
“We are waiting until the end to hold them accountable,” board Vice President Timothy Frazier said of Patchogue-based design firm BBS Architects, Landscape Architects & Engineers, which fired an architect said to have “dropped the ball” on the plans. “It’s such a small amount of money compared to the large amount of money that the project costs, that if you wait until the very end there is a possibility that they’re going to make some concessions. If you [litigate] right now it’ll just take longer and cost even more money down the road.”
School Business Administrator Michael Henery said one playground item now scheduled to be removed is called a comet, and spins very fast. The other is a similar apparatus — a squiggly post that rises and spins.
“Some of the kids would get on and couldn’t stop,” Mr. Henery said. “What was happening was the kids were getting extremely dizzy, they were falling off of it and getting hurt and getting upset stomachs from the dizziness.”
While a representative for an insurance company came out and did a health and safety inspection and said he was not going to write up the district, he did say the two pieces of equipment had to go.
“They shouldn’t have been there in the first place,” Mr. Conlon said. “We don’t build these facilities for a living. We put that emphasis on the people we hire to do the work and give us their recommendations.”
Mr. Henery said he does not know how the items in question got into the plans, because he knows the playground committee did not want them. The money, which brings the total cost of the project to $179,755.65, is also going to cover additional safety netting on another apparatus that is not high enough. Superintendent Debra Winter said that issue was actually brought to her attention by a physical education teacher, who noticed it was possible to tumble over the top.
“I understand we have to get them out of there,” Mr. Brabant said of the playground equipment. “We shouldn’t have to litigate, though. They should be responsible. We didn’t make those mistakes. We hired them to do the job. The firm made the mistake. They are liable.”
“We should be approving BBS taking this on and paying for it,” Mr. Conlon added. “I just don’t understand why we’re going to approve this. I don’t understand why this has to come out of our funds.”
Ms. Winter echoed Mr. Frazier that if the district attempts to fight now it’s just going to put a halt on those parts of the project altogether. She said litigation could take months or longer.
“We have to let them know how unhappy we are — and they know how unhappy we are — and weigh out what you need to do to get it done,” Mr. Frazier said. “These things happen. People make mistakes. They either own up to their mistakes or they don’t. Right now, we need to make it safe, and then we fight with them to compensate us for the mistakes that they made.”
When installing the new phones, administrators said it became apparent the company had the wrong type of phones. Ms. Winter said the district asked specifically to have models that allow someone to intercom into and out of a classroom.
“The company agreed to take as many as they can back and swap them out for higher models and run whatever additional wiring and hookups are needed,” Mr. Henery said. The additional cost there brings the total for the project up to $81,524.73.
The Board of Education also approved moving its meetings from Mondays to Tuesdays beginning in November.
Originally, trustees had scheduling conflicts that forced the meetings to Mondays.
Board President Barbara Dayton said the move gives members more time to go over the agenda and come prepared with questions.
The decision takes effect in November to not disturb the already-scheduled board meeting that follows the October 18 ribbon cutting ceremony for the unveiling of the results of a voter-approved expansion project.
LTV East Hampton, a nonprofit public access television for the Town of East Hampton, which currently live streams the board meetings via its YouTube channel, said it can facilitate the change even though it already live streams East Hampton School District’s Board of Education meetings on Tuesday evenings.
