‘That Just Wasn’t Honest’: Selectmen Call for Full Accounting of Delayed Waveny Elevator Project

Saying delays and cost overruns on the Waveny House elevator project are unacceptable, members of the Board of Selectmen this week called for more transparency from Public Works officials, a specific number for how much it has already cost and regular updates on the widely anticipated installation. 

Everyone is “frustrated” with the project, described as being on track for completion this month then just one week later pushed out to July-August, Selectman Amy Murphy Carroll noted.

“I’m incredibly frustrated with this, because since I was on the Board of Selectmen and I have asked at least once a month, ‘Where are we in the elevator? Are we okay? Are we on time?’ ” Murphy Carroll told DPW Buildings Superintendent Bill Oestmann during the regular selectmen meeting held Tuesday at Town Hall and via videoconference.

“Two weeks ago, we were told to be done by the end of April,” Murphy Carroll continued. “I’m very concerned that the current schedule gets hit. And it’s not for lack of asking and nonstop reassurance that we’re there. We can all handle bad news, right? It’s just way better to get the bad news ahead of time. In the first quarter, ‘How’s it going?’ ‘It’s going fine. It’s going fine. It’s going fine.’ It was not going fine. You could have told us, ‘It’s complicated,’ and I would just ask in the future that it’s better to give us the heads up that something is off schedule versus hoping you can catch up and get it done. We can handle that. But two weeks ago, we were told it would be done by the end of April, and this has been disruptive to a lot of people in town. And, it’s a very big, expensive project and I’m quite concerned given how long the schedule is out there and you do have the money encumbered, that that’s enough money to get it done because obviously the people who got the bid on this project, assumed a certain timeframe, and it’s obviously different.”

Oestmann said during the meeting that the town has “had a lot of problems with the manufacturer of the elevator.”

“To be blunt about it, they lied to us that they had everything in their Shelton location,” he said. “They did not. We didn’t find out until two months after we had it delivered that they didn’t have it yet. I can’t answer for why he did that. It was in a meeting, we were all there. That delayed us a little bit. We also had some issues with the electrical on the motors and stuff that, for whatever reason it was—I think it was, from my understanding, it was wired for a different country. So they had to reprogram, rewire, not only the motor, but all the controllers. And that took us another additional week. So we were getting stalled left and right. And then when they were putting us together, they discovered that when they assembled the elevator at the factory, which they did, they took pictures of it, they cross-threaded three out four bolts that they’re using.”

Oestmann added that he’s “not a fan of the manufacturer at this point.”

“But we’re married to it now and they’re getting through those problems,” he said. “We’re in a better place today. Now that they got the canopy on and they’re moving right along. There’s a lot of detail work that still has to be done once the elevator is actually installed—that would be all the wiring, the programming for the call buttons tying in the fire alarm to it they have down in the basement. We’ve still got to put the fire doors in place. All the work down there that has to be done, air conditioner was installed downstairs, so that’s done. They painted the attic and they painted the lower level already, so you’ll see the black. So it’s moving right along. We still have to cut the railing upstairs and make that connection.”

The exchange came during a general update on Public Works projects to the selectmen. 

According to Oestmann, the town so far has spent $3,753,099 on all three phases of the elevator project (against an original budget of $4 million), which includes the elevator itself as well as ADA-compliant bathrooms on the second floor and accessible routes within the Waveny House. (The town underwent a compliance investigation by federal officials, and because the second floor of Waveny House is a public use—the Recreation Department—the municipality must provide a way for disabled people to get there.)

According to Oestmann, there’s still $21,000 remaining in the elevator project account. 

Oestmann said the elevator installers are working 6 a.m. to 2 p.m. under their own union agreement, and that since it’s now wedding season at Waveny, “we have to shut down Fridays” and “we have to reset up on Monday, so our production week is only three days versus five to accommodate everything.”
First Selectman Dioonna Carlson said that the town may have made a different decision regarding use of Waveny House—for example, may not have booked weddings—if the information on the elevator project’s progress had been made clear. 

“We might not have booked weddings because then we could have not had to clean up, take down, reset up every week, which is creating significant delays and a headache for everyone, and added expense,” she said. “I want to know if that $21,000 that’s left is going to be enough. I want to hear from you right now: Are we done? Are you not going to come to us for any more money for this elevator or are we really kidding ourselves that the $21,000 that’s set in the elevator is going to be enough to complete it?”

In response, Oestmann said, “I won’t commit to that because I don’t know [the] unforeseen.”

He added, “We’re passed a lot of the risk. I feel very comfortable where we are.”

Carlson asked what things could go wrong now.

“I think it’s important for us because Amy’s been asking, I don’t like it and Amy doesn’t like it, and Steve doesn’t like this, ‘We’re fine. We’re fine. We’re fine. No, now we need money.’ So I want to understand what are the things that you’re concerned might happen at the end of this project that could cause this to possibly go over budget.”

Murphy Carroll noted that there are now new expenses tied to the project that aren’t being accounted for.

“Because it didn’t get done in the period of time that we were told it could get done—and we were told it could get done and you had every opportunity to say no, but nobody did,” she said. “So now beyond the fact that a bunch of town people who plan to use it, cannot use it and have to scramble, now you have to break down and set up all the time. Where’s the manpower for doing that? How’s that being paid? That certainly wasn’t in the budget.”

She called for a breakdown of the elevator project itself.

“And again, we can handle bad news,” Murphy Carroll said. “We cannot handle being in the dark… This happened, but to be told two weeks ago, we’re done in two weeks and then I went over there and the elevator is literally in pieces all over Waveny. That just wasn’t honest. And it’s not for lack of asking, and that’s what gets me the most because I had been nonstop asking about this one.”

Selectman Steve Karl turned to Carlson at one point in the meeting and noted that her administration had “inherited some doozies.”

“We are all in this together and I’d rather have the bad news up front,” he said. “Just keep us in the loop. That’s really what it is. If we hadn’t been down this road on projects in the past—and recently in the past—I think residents all have the back of their hair on their neck standing up when we talk about overruns and timing and everything on projects that we’re doing. And we’ve got to be a lot more attentive to what we promised from the beginning and the deliverables at the end. And this project has just been one of the worst projects from the minute we had to do it till now.”