The estimated completion date for the new Washington Nationals’ ballpark has been pushed back by the contractor to April 15, 2008, six weeks later than stipulated in the construction agreement and after the season starts.
The District’s project managers say they expect work will still finish on time, but what “on time” means, however, is another matter.
The city is contractually obligated to open the Southeast stadium to the Nationals by March 1, 2008, and faces millions of dollars in financial penalties for not delivering. The Nationals have been adamant about meeting the target, but D.C. leaders seem to have their eyes on another mark: Opening Day.
“We’re looking to be able to open the ballpark in the neighborhood of April 1,” Allen Lew, D.C. Sports
Entertainment Commission chief executive officer, said Tuesday.
Lew then added in a later conversation: “I have not conceded March 1.”
Council Member David Catania, an ardent stadium critic, said ballpark proponents “bring duplicity to new and uncharted heights.” The stadium is late, he said, timelines are shifting, costs are increasing and the District will have to pay the price.
“I’d like to have a meeting of the minds about the status of this project,” Catania said. “Right now, we don’t have it. There’s increasing disarray.”
The estimate for “substantial completion” of the stadium was shifted from March 1 by the contracting team of Clark/Hunt/Smoot because the city took six weeks longer than promised to deliver the land for development.
The contractors are now negotiating an “equitable adjustment” to their deal, which would formally move the completion date to mid-April and shield their fees and bonuses from penalties for late delivery.
During a council hearing Friday, Catania asked Clark Construction’s Tom Kenton whether April 15 is accurate, and Kenton said simply, “Yes, sir.”
But workers met the critical early October timeline for structural steel installation, Lew said, putting the project back on schedule. The April 15 completion date is a “contractual matter,” he said, and is not necessarily related to construction.
“That date has no resemblance to the completion date of the stadium, which is on track to be completed in March,” Ward 2 Council Member Jack Evans said.
