A dedication ceremony is postponed, and officials question whether the school will be ready to open Jan. 4 as planned.

Uncompleted work at the new Westbrook Middle School has postponed a dedication ceremony and called into question whether the school would be ready for students on Jan. 4.

The school department was supposed to receive its certificate of occupancy Tuesday, but the city’s code enforcement officer, fire inspector and electrical inspector said more work would have to be done before that could happen, and that work wouldn’t be completed in time for Saturday’s scheduled dedication ceremony.

At a hastily called meeting Tuesday, the middle school steering committee voted to postpone the dedication ceremony to an undetermined date and direct architect Harriman Associates to write a letter to Harvey Construction, demanding a detailed schedule for completing the project before Jan. 4.

If the project is not completed by that date, Harvey Construction would be held financially accountable for costs incurred due to the delay, such as having to reschedule the movers.

“The accountability is going to go back to the architect and the construction company,” Superintendent Reza Namin said Tuesday.

Residents voted in 2007 to approve the new, $34-million, 135,000-square-foot Westbrook Middle School and auditorium on Stroudwater Street. When the project went out to bid, the school department proposed to open it in September 2010. But, according to Principal Brian Mazjanis, winning bidder Harvey Construction said it would be able to finish the project sooner.

Now, Mazjanis said, teachers have already packed their supplies in anticipation of movers arriving at Wescott Junior High School next Wednesday to take the boxes to the new middle school.

“You can only live out of boxes for so long,” the principal said.

Site superintendent Jim Klemarczyk of Harvey Construction said Wednesday being able to open on Jan. 4 “is not going to be a problem,” but declined to comment further.

Klemarczyk walked through the building Wednesday with Code Enforcement Officer Rick Gouzie and Capt. Chuck Jarrett, the city’s fire inspector, to compile a list of what needs to be completed in order for Gouzie to issue a certificate of occupancy. Jarrett and Gouzie outlined some of that work at the meeting Tuesday, which included representatives of the steering committee, the school department, Harriman Associates and the city.

“We need to run all of the systems,” said Jarrett. “I don’t want to say, ‘Yeah, you can go ahead and do it,’ and then find out that things don’t work.”

Jarrett said the tests on the fire alarm system and the generator haven’t been completed. According to Gouzie, the water hasn’t been turned on, so there are no working bathrooms, and much of the electrical work is not finished, including the labeling of the equipment.

“If there’s something that goes wrong, no one knows what they’re pulling,” he said.

Steve Corey, the city’s electrical inspector, added that the lighting hadn’t been put up on the outside of the building and the dishwasher in the kitchen hadn’t been wired.

“Everyday I come in here and find something new to be worried about,” said Jarrett. “I think that’s going to be a problem for your Jan. 4 deadline.”

With two short weeks coming up due to holidays, school officials said they, too, weren’t confident that the work could be completed on schedule.

“Time is shrinking,” said City Councilor John O’Hara, co-chairman of the building committee. “It doesn’t sound like you’re going to be able to make the 4th.”

School Committee member Ed Symbol said when he’s been by the site at 4 p.m., all the workers have packed up and left.

“There’s no sense of urgency,” he said.

Mazjanis said at the beginning of every meeting with the architect and construction company he’s asked the same question: “How are we doing on schedule?” And he’s continuously been assured that everything would be done on time.

“How do we get from eight weeks ago we’re all on schedule to eight weeks later were behind?” Symbol asked.

Symbol said he doesn’t believe the construction company cares that the dedication ceremony, at which they were expecting a crowd of 1,000, had to be postponed. And, according to Mazjanis, who also planned a student orientation for Monday, Dec. 21, it’s not an issue to take lightly.

“I wanted to get my students into the school before it opened. That’s not going to happen now,” he said. “That’s a loss for the school department.”

The biggest issue at hand, Symbol said, is when the determination needs to be made about whether students should be dropped off at the new school after their vacation ¬- and whether teachers should pack up the rest of their supplies.

“We have a lot of nervous staff right now,” said sixth-grade teacher Colette Gagnon.

Anthony Roy, an architect from Harriman who attended the meeting Tuesday, said that Harriman would issue a letter to Harvey immediately. Stakeholders are scheduled to meet again Thursday for an update.

“It’s up to Harvey at this point,” Roy said. “There are certain pieces of the puzzle that need to be 100 percent complete. Life safety is one of them.”

Though some expressed their frustration with Harvey Construction, said that, up to this point, it’s been a good company to work with, and it would be important to maintain a cooperative relationship.

“You don’t want to bite the hand that feeds you,” O’Hara said.

City Administrator Jerre Bryant added that they should be careful of putting too much pressure on Harvey to meet the deadline, forcing them to cut corners and leaving the school department with even bigger problems to deal with after the construction company is gone.

“We’ve got to make sure we’ve got a balance here that, yes, we’re pushing them hard, but we’ve got to keep an eye on things,” Bryant said.

O’Hara suggested pushing back the opening date to after the school’s February vacation, but Mazjanis said he’d rather keep trying for the scheduled opening.

“My teachers packed up all their stuff,” he said. “That’s not an unsubstantial hardship on the schools.”

Rene Daniel, the other co-chairman of the building committee, said while there needs to be a push to “passionately and aggressively” continue working toward that deadline, it’s important for everyone to keep in mind the magnificence of the project on the whole.

“We stood in front of a lot of people and made a lot of promises,” he said. “We hit a glitch. We’ve just got to keep moving forward.”

Meanwhile, Christine Latini, the chief organizer for the dedication ceremony, has switched her focus from tying together the last-minute details of the event to letting everyone know that it’s not happening Saturday.

She’s had public services change the messages on the four electronic signs throughout the city and put up notices on the city’s public access channels. Though the postponement means more work for Latini, she and Namin both said that it’s important the community’s first impression of the school is a strong one, even if that means waiting.

“It’s the best building in the city and we want to portray that,” Latini said. “We really want them to see it done – finished.”

Men work outside the Performing Arts Center entrance to the new Westbrook Middle School on Tuesday. The Jan. 4 opening of the school could be delayed because of unfinished work. (Staff photo by Brandon McKenney)

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