Another $800K Needed for Civic Center Construction

Novato says it needs another $800,000 to help cover the cost of the new Civic Center administrative offices, money it plans to borrow from the city’s vehicle replacement fund.

When the project—which includes offices for about 60 employees, an underground parking garage and small plaza on Machin Avenue— was approved in 2011, the cost was estimated at around $14 million. But that did not include a 10 percent contingency fee, typically paid at the completion of a project. Instead only 2 percent was set aside, said Brian Cochran, Novato’s finance director.

“We never actually budgeted the full contingency amount,” he said. “Now that we’re further in the process, because of furniture and the cost of other items going up…we are having to increase the budget.”

Most of the cost of the new construction is coming from funds Novato received from the now defunct Novato Redevelopment agency.

A part of the reason of the spike in costs is $440,000 being spent on new workstations and furniture for the lobby, conference room and break area.

To cover the new expenses, the city will ask the council to approve borrowing $700,000 from the Vehicle Replacement Fund, money set aside for buying and repairing city vehicles.  The funds represent about 20 percent of the total in the fund and will be borrowed in $70,000 annual installments over the next decade, according to Cochran.

On top of that, completion of the administrative complex is now three weeks late, prompting the city to ask the owner for a six-week lease extension at a cost of $28,000. If the city did not get a lease extension, it would be looking at paying $110,000 under the new terms of the lease, according to Julian Skinner, an engineering manager for the city of Novato.