The Roslyn Union Free School District (District) is governed by the Board of Education (Board) which comprises seven elected members. The Board is responsible for the general management and control of the District’s financial and educational affairs. The Superintendent of Schools (Superintendent) is the chief executive officer of the District and is responsible, along with other administrative staff, for the day-to-day management of the District under the direction of the Board.

On April 6, 2000, District voters authorized the construction of additions to and reconstruction of District buildings, at a maximum cost of $25.5 million. Project costs were financed by bond proceeds of $23.9 million and general fund appropriations of $1.6 million.

Scope and Objective

The objective of our audit was to examine capital projects financed from the proceeds of debt authorized by District voters in April 2000 for the reconstruction of District buildings, for the period February 1, 2000 to June 30, 2004. Our audit addressed the following related questions:

• Did the District establish and implement appropriate management controls and adequately monitor capital projects?
  
  
• Was the construction work that was actually performed of acceptable quality?

Audit Results

Our audit disclosed that the District did not implement and follow appropriate management controls over capital construction projects. Of the 154 payments totaling $14.5 million made to vendors awarded construction contracts for the three projects, support for four payments, totaling $200,072, was not available for examination. In addition, seven of the 150 available applications for payment, totaling $1,188,740, were not certified by the architect prior to payment.

In 2004, the Board hired a new construction consultant to review work that was overseen by the prior consultant.¹ The new consultant estimated that the District would have to pay approximately $862,000 to correct deficiencies in the work performed by the general contractor hired for the Roslyn Middle School Interior Renovations and Additions project. The new consultant received approximately $128,000 for this review work, which the District would not have had to pay if the original construction consultant and the former architect had provided proper oversight and required construction contractors to perform to the specifications contained in their respective contracts.

The District failed to retain any money from a contractor for two change orders totaling $435,750, even though the contract required the District to retain 5 percent from each of the applications for payment submitted by the contractor.

Comments of District Officials

The results of our audit and recommendations have been discussed with District officials and their comments, which appear in Appendix A, have been considered in preparing this report. Except as indicated in Appendix A, District officials generally agreed with our recommendations and indicated they planned to initiate corrective action. An OSC comment concerning the District’s response can be found in Appendix B.

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¹ According to the construction consultant’s contract with the District, his duties are equivalent to the duties of a construction manager, which include, but are not limited to, assisting the District in the administration of the bid process, monitoring construction costs, reviewing applications submitted by contractors for progress and final payments, and determining that construction work is being performed in accordance with contract documents.