The Sedona City Council approved an 11th change order for the Forest Road extension project during its Sept. 10 meeting, which will increase the amount of Fann Contracting’s contract for the project by an additional $1,474,527. This is in addition to the previous change order approved by council on July 9, which increased the cost of the project by $3,777,950.

According to the city’s latest project figures submitted with the change order, the total cost of the contract with Fann has risen from $10,683,253 to $16,945,572.

The estimated cost of the extension project overall was $1.3 million in April 2017, $2,772,047 in October 2019, $9.1 million in March 2023, $20.4 million in June 2023, per the fiscal year 2024 budget, and $21,002,901 in May 2024, per the FY25 budget.

Associate engineer Bob Welch explained to council that the latest change order will cover soil nailing, “mobilization,” utility relocation trenching and moving some loose soil, with individual cost components of $738,151, $395,000, $339,550 and $1,825, respectively.

“We had rock bolting originally in this contract … down near the entrance for [State Route] 89A, where Forest Road comes in,” Welch said. “As a result of the excavation, we have found underlying conditions that weren’t reflective of rock bolting. We called in the geotech tactical engineer to assess the situation and it was [determined] that rock bolting would not be a feasible application here and that we would utilize soil nailing at location. The soil nailing application is more costly because it requires more soil nails and grouting, so we’ll have roughly twice as many soil nails and grouting.”

Both rock bolting and soil nailing entail the insertion of metal rods into earthworks for stabilization and differ primarily in whether the rods are actively or passively stressed.

In reply to a question from Councilman Brian Fultz, Welch said that if the change order were not approved and the soil nailing not completed, there would be additional erosion from the slope in question and an adjoining debris collection area “would have to be cleaned out from time to time.”

“What are the lessons learned about this for the future?” Vice Mayor Holli Ploog asked. “We had utilities that we didn’t know existed, we had delays because of the relocation. All that was on us. None of that was on APS or Optimum or whoever. What is it that we can do to improve so that to the degree possible we can mitigate this in advance?”

Director of Public Works Kurt Harris and his staff “have recently gotten with some of these utilities that have had issues … and let them know that we expect better cooperation,” Deputy City Manager Andy Dickey said.

Harris told council that city staff “would like” to work on mapping all utilities using the city GIS system, but hastened to add that this information would not be publicly available for reasons of “discreteness.” He also noted that during design work for Ranger Station Park, the city experienced similar issues with unidentified utilities. “Fortunately, we did that in-house, or that project would have went way over budget,” Harris said.

Welch said that the COVID-19 pandemic response resulted in “no sense of urgency from APS.”

“It’s change order number 11. Is there going to be a 12, a 13?” Fultz asked. “How much more exposure do we have to this thing getting yet more expensive?”

“I’m hoping that this is the last one,” Welch said. “We take every effort to save money wherever we can.”

“What’s the chances of us facing another million dollars?” Fultz asked.

“Very little,” Welch said.

“So you don’t expect to bring back a further contract amendment?” Vice Mayor Holli Ploog had previously asked Welch on July 9.

“I hope not,” Welch had said at that time. “Things happen, of course.”

“I don’t want to spend more money on this project,” Ploog said.

Mayor Scott Jablow described the repeated increases as an “ungodly amount of overages above [the city] budget.”

Council then approved spending the additional $1.47 million unanimously.

The tentative completion date for the extension is currently March 28, but Welch told council that “there’s some negotiation still in process on that.”