Architects resign from Hempfield Area High School renovation project
HEMPFIELD TOWNSHIP, Pa. (KDKA) -- A Westmoreland County high school's renovation is possibly back to the drawing board.
Hempfield Area High School is looking for a new architect after the previous one resigned.
The firm Core Architects was hired about 2 years ago. Now with reportedly $2.4 million going to them, they have resigned from the project. A former board member and taxpayer is concerned this project could get pricey quick.
The Hempfield school board was working with Core Architects on the project to renovate part of their aging school. Last week, the firm resigned. This past Monday the board accepted it.
"The firm has resigned, and we're back to square one, it seems like," former school board member Tony Bompiani said.
Bompiani, a Hempfield graduate and taxpayer, was part of the team that hired the former architect. He is now concerned that the project budget will continue to balloon. According to him, the board will now have to hire a new firm, see if the old firm will let them use any drawings and see if the new firm will come in at a similar cost.
"We picked probably the worst time to try and do a building, but our high school was in desperate need of the renovation. We started before COVID so we couldn't have predicted this," he said over the phone.
It's estimated the renovations will be around $150 million. Originally, Bompiani tells KDKA-TV they wanted it to be closer to $135 million. He doesn't want to see taxes go up because of overspending.
"There's only a few ways they can go and it still means more money for the taxpayers to pay no matter which way they go," Bompiani told KDKA-TV.
He said the scope of the project could be daunting as well. According to the former board member, with the cost of everything, the project needs to be reevaluated because prices will go up. They may get less bang for their buck.
"They're going to get less for their dollar to try and build the same building," Bompiani said.
Hempfield Area School District provided KDKA-TV with a letter sent to families which we included an excerpt from below.
"Core Architects was employed by the District in February 2022 and has been the architect of record throughout the pre-construction phases. As you know, at the bid event in August for the approximately $130 million dollar project, the bids came in $16 million over expected for the first phase. The Hempfield Area School District has honored its contractual agreement and paid for work completed in the feasibility study and preconstruction portion of this project, totaling approximately $2.4 million to Core Architects."
