Convention Center’s Tab Up $400,000

The cost of constructing San Diego’s waterfront convention center increased by $400,000 Tuesday because the contractor who is building the $118-million center is having to work overtime and will soon start double shifts to complete the job on schedule.

The extra money isn’t going to the contractor but rather to the Port District’s independent construction manager--Fluor Constructors Inc.--which says it needs more personnel to keep up.

With the increase, Fluor’s contract with the Port District goes from a little more than $2 million to $2.4 million.

Billy Crockett, Fluor’s top official on the 11-acre job site at the foot of 5th Avenue, told the commissioners that the contractor, a partnership of Tutor-Saliba and Perini Corp., is working three to four hours of overtime each day and working Saturdays.

A Second Shift

Soon, as work on the convention center accelerates, the contractor will begin a second shift, and it will keep the second shift in use until the center is finished as scheduled, on May 11, 1989.

Crockett said overtime and a second shift are needed so the convention center can be built in the 28-month construction timetable agreed to in the contract approved by the Port District in March. Crockett also said that, as part of Fluor’s preconstruction analysis before the award of the contract, it was evident that Tutor-Saliba/Perini would have to rely on overtime and second shifts to meet their schedule.

Don Nay, the Port District’s executive director, said the contractor has “the freedom to work whatever shifts he wants,” as long as it notifies the Port District. Nay said the increased work schedule has increased the burden on Fluor, as well as on the Port District. The Port District, however, doesn’t anticipate adding more people, Nay said.

Of the $396,399 that will be paid to Fluor, $233,718 is for an extra construction engineer who will provide inspection services during overtime and the second shift; $147,568 is to pay for clerical help and equipment and supplies used by construction inspectors; $11,430 is for Fluor’s extra costs, mainly temporary employees, during the bid and preconstruction analysis period, and $3,682 is for the purchase of a time-lapse video unit.

The video unit, which will be installed on the roof of the adjacent USO Club, is necessary “in order to provide a record of the construction progress and to alleviate possible future claims by the contractor,” according to a Port District memo.

Of the nearly $400,000, Nay said that $69,290, which is to pay for things such as office equipment, a word processing system, testing equipment, hard hats and the like, was money that the Port District had expected to spend itself. Instead, he said, the money will be spent by Fluor to pay for the same items.