Marblehead panel votes to send Glover job out to bid

MARBLEHEAD – Glover School Building Committee members unanimously authorized the owners? project managers to advertise for bids for the $20.19 million Glover School Wednesday evening.Committee member Fran Sheridan called the vote, “What we have worked for three years.” The bids for subcontractors and a general contractor will be opened in May. The advertisements will be posted after final documents for the school are submitted.However, the vote came after a lengthy discussion of school costs and savings, brought up by committee member Barbara Anderson in a discussion of the Feb. 29 minutes.Anderson has been a major voice for Citizens for Limited Taxation for nearly four decades and was named to the Glover School Building Committee in 2011.The committee set the $20.19 million cost Feb. 29 after cutting $400,000 from the total cost, including about $200,000 worth of needed items that could be restored to the project if the bids are lower than $20.19 million.Anderson asked to have a statement included in those minutes in which she said, “I applaud Dick Nohelty?s statement that there will be an effort not to exceed the cost presented to Town Meeting ($20.2 million),” but said the committee seemed to be treating the $20.2 million “as the floor,” and the alternates would be added to reach that amount if the bids came in low.?I can?t vote as a member of this committee to spend the full $20.2 million on the Glover School project, when we might be able to save taxpayers some of that amount.”Committee member Robert Schaeffer strongly disagreed with Anderson. “We are a committee,” he said. “We all came to agreement on our approach to this budget. Barbara?s statement implies that we are not keeping our word. If the bids are low, the alternate items are put back in, that?s a Massachusetts School Building Agency protocol.”He said Anderson was “grandstanding.”The committee voted to include Anderson?s statement in the Feb. 29 meeting minutes. She originally asked to have it included in those minutes at the March 7 meeting. Owner?s project manager Chuck Adams said he intended to include it but didn?t.Chairman Dick Nohelty said including Anderson?s statement in the record was a part of the discussion the committee had when it “decided the direction it wanted to go.”?We?re staying away from emotions,” he said. “We want to make sure that things are done correctly.”