PITTSFIELD, Mass. — The City Council has authorized the borrowing of $3 million for new boilers at Pittsfield High School — a project that was originally going to be funded by ARPA.

The nearly 100-year-old boilers are original to the building and have exceeded their useful life, officials say. They are converted locomotive engines that are extremely inefficient and expensive to maintain.

The replacement design was recently completed and a low bid was received. After looking at the numbers, it was clear that the allocated $1 million in American Rescue Plan Act funds would not be enough.

"$213,210 was spent on emergency repairs and the design work for the replacement project," Finance Director Matthew Kerwood confirmed in an email.
 
"The low and only bid for the replacement was $2,482,000, however given the complexity of this project I felt that a 20 percent contingency would be needed which gets to the $3,000,000 authorization. If the entire amount is not needed, the remaining unused balance will be rescinded at some point in the future."

The project is also time-sensitive, as one boiler is non-operational and another is severely compromised. If they fail during the heating season, the school will have to close.

"The contractor that was the low bid, in 30 days he can walk away from that bid if he wants to, and the other problem is I need to get this project underway to hopefully get them in and running by the time school reopens up for wintertime," Building Maintenance Director Brian Filiault explained.

"This is a major project, a major project. We're taking three locomotives out of that building and it's no easy thing. I mean, the building is built around it and we have a small portal that we actually will be able to get it out, we'll have to crane everything else. It's a very labor-intensive, very hard job, and I'm afraid of the timeframe because I can't run those boilers again. They've gone as far as they're going to go."

On Tuesday, the council waved Rule 27 for the borrowing's approval. Filiault said he doesn’t see an alternative way to approach the project.

He said the process was "very involved." The city first has to get an architect and a design company, which is timed because of the bidding process, and it then become increasingly complex.

"It's a big building, it's an old building, and as we went through the design, we discovered more and more problems with the existing system that was there," Filiault explained.

"It just ate up time and that's where we're at."

As soon as the systems could be shut off, he wanted to get a demolition crew to start work immediately but reported that "we've gone past that timeframe" because they have been off for a month. If everything goes right, he is looking at about three weeks before someone can get in there.

"It's hard to explain but it's a very, very difficult job," he said.

He explained that, before the design phase, original cost estimates were in the realm of what they were thinking.

"Once we got to the design, we went from basically thinking we're going to remove two boilers and put two boilers back in to now removing all three locomotive boilers and putting three boilers back in," Filiault said, adding that there are pumps and large units that also need to be replaced.

"So it just ended up exceeding what our cost was."

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