Construction of Secchia Center may finish under $90M budget

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Although it’s more than a year away from its completion date, the MSU College of Human Medicine’s Grand Rapids campus is projected to be completed almost $3 million under budget.

The Secchia Center — scheduled to be completed in June 2010 — broke ground in April 2008. Initially, the project was estimated to cost about $90 million, but progress made thus far indicates $3 million in cost reductions could be made.

“Of course there’s a lot of construction to do yet, but at this point, it looks like the cost is going to be somewhere around $87 million,” said Bob Nestle, a university engineer at the Physical Plant.

Chris Burns, the university’s project representative for the Physical Plant, said every construction plan has a contingent monetary amount built into the maximum budget that is set aside for unexpected costs. To this point, Burns said larger problems have been avoided.

“We’re not finding a lot of existing problems with the site,” he said. “We’re also finding that the plans are very good plans and they’re not missing a lot of things. So we’re not having to dip in the construction contingencies, and that’s why we have a high level of confidence that it’s going to be brought in under budget.”

Although projections are positive, College of Human Medicine Dean Marsha Rappley said it was difficult to guarantee the project would finish under budget.

“You never know until the end of the project because all of these things are highly variable, in terms of market prices that fluctuate,” Rappley said.

“We’ve not overspent, at least at this point in time, what we were supposed to spend up until now.”

After the 180,000-square-foot facility is completed, faculty from the college will move into the building during the summer. Classes are expected to begin in August 2010.

Douglass Norton, project manager for construction, said the exterior portions of the building are still being completed, including the roof and masonry that covers the metal studs and sheathing of the building.

“The next big milestone would be to complete the enclosure of the building in June 2009,” Norton said.

During the summer, interior work also will be completed, including mechanical and electrical ducts and piping that lines the ceiling and walls.

Rappley visited the site last week and walked through auditorium, classroom, lobby and commons spaces.

“The quality of the workmanship is amazing,” she said. “I can just see the students and the faculty occupying all of these wonderful spaces.”

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