Carbondale trustees press for clearer accounting after Aquatic Center contingency and fundraising shifts

Carbondale trustees pressed project staff and the owner's representative on budget changes and contingency accounting for the town's Aquatic Center during an update April 22.

Trustees said a recently revised reporting format made it difficult to track how the project moved from a previously "fully funded" position to one showing an apparent $900,000 gap. Tammy Tucker, the new Wember representative on the project, told trustees the $900,000 had been interpreted by the project team as an increase attributed to the project budget, but that she had not found a board motion that explicitly approved moving that amount into the project total.

"I did not find a motion from the board that, officially moved that to increase the project budget," Tucker said. "If that was a mistake or that was apparently applied, then that's certainly a correction that we can make."

The discussion focused on explaining the difference between the guaranteed maximum price (GMP) and the total project budget, and how change orders move money from an owner's contingency into the GMP. Tucker said, "The GMP is the construction project budget. The project budget is more than…