Where the two new high schools stand

Warwick is building two replacement high schools on a $350 million bond that voters approved in 2022. The School Building Committee, which approves the bills and the change orders, meets on the first Wednesday of most months at 7:30 in the morning, which is not an easy meeting for a working parent to attend. This is what its filed record says as of this week.

How far along

The contractor’s August payment applications put Pilgrim at 27 percent complete and Toll Gate at 41 percent. The official completion dates, last stated in November 2025, are October 2027 for Toll Gate and spring 2028 for Pilgrim.

Payments to the construction manager have run about $13 million a month since June.

Change orders

Change orders are the adjustments that get made after a price is set, and they are where a project’s budget is won or lost. On August 5 the Building Committee approved a net increase of about $137,000 at Pilgrim. At Toll Gate it approved a net increase of about $181,000, which is what was left after roughly $743,000 in credits offset a longer list of additions, including a redesigned mechanical room and electrical service for a new transformer.

The project manager told the committee that change orders are forecast to total 2.4 percent of the contract at Pilgrim and 1 percent at Toll Gate, against an industry average of about 3 percent. He also reported “$7.8 mil unencumbered budget.” The minutes do not explain how that figure relates to the contingency numbers reported earlier in the year, and that is a question I would ask.

Tariffs

Steel tariffs have added about $382,000 in change orders so far, including one on August 5 that the minutes tie to an additional 25 percent tariff in June. The Toll Gate steel comes from a Canadian supplier. Building Committee members have asked for a running total of tariff costs, which seems like the least the public should get.

What is not in the public record yet

The minutes of the Building Committee’s June 3 meeting were approved on July 1 but have not been filed with the state. That agenda included two large change orders tied to the project’s longer schedule, one of $999,089 for the project manager and one of $600,000 for Pilgrim’s architect. Until those minutes are posted, the public record does not show what happened to them.

The athletic facilities also remain an open question. Voters rejected the $50 million bond in February that would have finished them, and no other funding source has been identified in the minutes since.

Check my reading

The Building Committee’s agendas and minutes are on the Secretary of State’s open meetings portal. If you think I got something wrong, email me and I will fix it.