Sugar Grove board approves HVAC change order and contingency use for police facility

Trustees voted July 7 to approve a change order to the police department construction to address HVAC ductwork that runs through the evidence room and to authorize contingency spending for owner-supplied equipment and furniture.

Chief Rollins presented the problem: ductwork as installed encroaches on the evidence room and reduces storage headroom and the usability of high-density shelving. Gordon & Clark representatives told the board the duct location was specified in the mechanical design and that the omission of a security feature in the duct routing was an oversight by the mechanical engineer. A Gordon & Clark representative said in part, “Hindsight is always 20/20 … it was an oversight by our mechanical engineer.” (Gordon & Clark representative)

Staff described two repair options: install security bars inside the ductwork at lower cost, which would preserve the existing routing but limit some shelving, or reroute the ductwork into the attic, which staff and the police chief said would restore full storage capability and resolve the security concern. Gordon & Clark offered to contribute $8,900 toward the work; the full attic reroute estimate was described in discussion as about $28,000 with the contractor offering to cover part of the cost, leaving the village responsible for roughly $20,000.

Trustees debated whether to press the architect’s errors-and-omissions insurer to cover the correction. The architect said the firm’s deductible and the business decision of whether to claim insurance made a claim unlikely to resolve the cost immediately. Trustee discussion centered on public-safety risk, the value of full shelving capacity, and the size of the overall project budget (the PD project was discussed as a multi-million-dollar undertaking). One trustee said doing the attic work now was preferable to managing an ongoing security concern.

By roll call the board approved the change order and the request to apply contingency funds. The approved change order directs the contractor to proceed with the attic reroute and updates the project contingency accounting.

The action also authorized use of contingency funds to purchase owner-supplied equipment and to contract for furniture from a vendor identified in staff materials. Staff reported an initial contingency balance of $325,000 with about $220,900 remaining; owner-supplied items and the furniture vendor selection total roughly $102,000, leaving an estimated $118,000 in contingency after the purchases. Chief Rollins said the furniture vendor quoted about $109,000 versus prior estimates in the $150,000–$170,000 range, and that selecting the lower-cost vendor would save the village tens of thousands of dollars.

What’s next: staff will finalize change-order paperwork with Gordon & Clark and the construction contractor and will proceed with the owner-supplied equipment and furniture purchases authorized by the board. The project remains on schedule, staff said.