BOZEMAN – The Bozeman School Board made the decision last night to delay the construction of the new stadium due to an unexpected bump in the estimated cost of the project.
The bid for the stadium came in at about $9.6 million dollars. The Bozeman School Board has $7.5 million in the budget.
Initially, there was a discussion if they should refurbish the current stadium at Bozeman High School, but it was more cost efficient to build a new one.
With the bid being drastically more than what is in the budget, they are going back to the drawing board.
“I think it’s a matter of timing,” Deputy Superintendent of Bozeman School District Steve Johnson said. “When we reached out to the contractors that didn’t bid and said, ‘what’s going on? We thought you were interested,’ because they were expressing interest in the project and they just said you know with the weather we’ve had this spring, we’re kind of behind on the projects we have.”
Johnson said this gives the board more time to look at where cuts can be made for the new facility.
“It’s fine,” Johnson said. “I think that it’s not going to affect the final end date that much and that’s the important thing and it will also allow us hopefully to bring these costs back down into our budget.”
It won’t be long until the board discusses this project again.
“It’ll probably be August,” Johnson said. “As soon as August, because what we’re hoping to do is maybe bid it again this fall with a different timeline so it gives the contractors the ability to schedule their work over the next year.”
This hasn’t been the easiest process for the board so far, but Johnson believes it’ll be worth it.
“Some pains here, if you will, with getting this coordinated but I think it’s going to be a great facility for the community once it’s done and it’ll serve both schools,” Johnson said.
The board is planning for the construction of the new stadium to be complete by the fall of 2019.
