In comparison, current construction costs for the new Montezuma-Cortez High School are lower than initial figures. Current budgetary funds have also dipped over the past three years.
When the project was announced in 2012, the total cost of a planned 162,500-square-foot schoolhouse was forecast at $43.9 million. The current 152,000 square-foot structure is now projected to cost a total of $41.5 million, a decrease of almost 5.5 percent over initial estimates, according to figures released by Montezuma-Cortez Re-1 superintendent Alex Carter.
In an email sent to The Cortez Journal on Aug. 6, Carter revealed that soft and hard costs for the project, scaled down to a 152,000-square-foot facility, totaled more than $5.7 million and $35.8 million, respectively. Soft costs include architectural design, land acquisition and infrastructure systems. Hard costs include actual construction.
In 2012, the district was awarded a $22.7 million Building Excellent Schools Today (BEST) grant to fund 52 percent of the total costs. The remainder of the project, which voters approved by a 5-to-3 margin, was a 20-year bond totaling $21.2 million.
According to Carter, those numbers have also decreased from initial announcements. BEST grant funding now totals more than $22.2 million, a decrease of 2.2 percent over initial totals. Representing an 11 percent decrease, funding from property taxes also dropped to more than $18.9 million.
In his email, Carter didn’t offer an explanation for the decreases, but he did state that a $250,000 supplement from the school district’s capital reserve fund would likely be reimbursed by $100,000.
Approved in early 2014, the quarter-million supplemental expense was necessary to ensure the building included a geothermal heat exchange system, Carter said.
According to Carter, final construction costs will become available in early December.
