Plan Would Speed Bid to Cool Schools

The volunteer committee overseeing work to be done with revenue from Los Angeles school repair bonds approved a tentative plan Wednesday that would speed up installation of long-awaited air conditioning in classrooms so that work would be completed by the summer of 1999 instead of a year later.

Around the Los Angeles Unified School District, a total of 152 schools would be in line for the “fast track” repairs under a timetable approved by the Proposition BB committee that would replace a slower district plan.

In the San Fernando Valley, the faster plan would affect seven elementary schools, two middle schools and one high school. Work at the Valley’s other 87 schools was assigned under a previous phase and would continue as scheduled, a district spokesman said.

Although the plan will not go into effect unless it gets final approval by the Board of Education at its meeting Monday, the chairman of the Proposition BB committee hailed Wednesday’s vote as clearing the way for speedy construction.

“As soon as the contracts get signed, there will be a swarm of air-conditioning people--like a big swarm of locusts--at schools,” said Steve Soboroff, a Westside real estate developer who heads the 11-member committee.

The committee’s plan would give control of future air-conditioning work to PG&E; Energy Services instead of the 10 district project managers now overseeing the effort. Those managers would continue to supervise jobs already underway or contracted for.

PG&E; won the committee’s approval after a lengthy bidding process against 11 other firms that dragged on for nearly a year.

The committee was looking for a contractor that could provide cheaper, speedier and more efficient work than the district managers, Soboroff said, noting that district managers could then focus on other school repairs such as roofing and plumbing.

The district and the company are working out details of a contract they intend to submit for the board’s vote next week. The company’s bid is expected to be between $153 million and $163 million, a lawyer representing the school district said.

That is about $15 million to $20 million more than the district’s previous estimate for the slower project, said Roger Rasmussen, a district analyst.

However, the PG&E; bid comes with a guarantee that work would be finished by the summer of 1999 and within budget, or the company would have to pay for any delays or additional costs. The bid also includes a $12.5-million discount on the district’s electric bills over a five-year period from the city-owned Department of Water and Power, which is a partner of PG&E; Energy Services in this venture, said PG&E; project manager Lee O’Loughlin.

Some committee members raised questions about whether the PG&E; bid would actually cost any more than the previous, slower plan, saying they had doubts that the school district’s figures were accurate.

“The premium is a phantom,” said David Barulich, a representative of the watchdog group Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Assn.

Valley schools that would be air-conditioned on the fast track if the proposal is approved are: Carpenter Avenue School in Studio City, Darby Avenue School in Northridge, Mountain View School in Tujunga, Sherman Oaks School, Sunland School, Tarzana School and Portola Middle School in Tarzana, and Woodland Hills School, Hale Middle School and El Camino Real High School in Woodland Hills.

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