Minvilla, like any historic rehab project, is an expensive project. It is not, however, out of line costwise with other projects like it. That's pretty easy to document.
You imply that the cost of Minvilla is ever-rising. Others have used more hyperbolic language to characterize this supposed ongoing project cost increase.
To our knowledge, there's only been one significant cost increase in this project, and it was an increase over a preliminary estimate made in the absence of an actual contractor's estimate.
How'd that come about? When the former developer's earliest cost estimates for Minvilla went public,they were artificially low (total project cost of $4,500,000; hard costs $3,000,000). The former developer's estimate was a ballpark made without construction drawings and a contractor's estimate. The figure of $3,800,000 was first published, I believe, in the News-Sentinel, and lodged in the public consciousness.
We now have much better information (completed construction documents and a firm estimate from the contractor. Project cost is much higher than the preliminary (approximately $6,200,000 with developer contribution; $7,000,000 if the developer retains developer's fee) one to which people indexed their expectations, but it is also realistic.
I think there are people in the community who mistakenly believe that there was a recent "cost increase" from $6.2M to $7M. That's inaccurate. The former figure is the total project cost with the developer's fee being donated to the project; the latter fee is total project cost with the developer retaining his fee.
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robertfinley writes:
Matt,
Minvilla, like any historic rehab project, is an expensive project. It is not, however, out of line costwise with other projects like it. That's pretty easy to document.
You imply that the cost of Minvilla is ever-rising. Others have used more hyperbolic language to characterize this supposed ongoing project cost increase.
To our knowledge, there's only been one significant cost increase in this project, and it was an increase over a preliminary estimate made in the absence of an actual contractor's estimate.
How'd that come about? When the former developer's earliest cost estimates for Minvilla went public,they were artificially low (total project cost of $4,500,000; hard costs $3,000,000). The former developer's estimate was a ballpark made without construction drawings and a contractor's estimate. The figure of $3,800,000 was first published, I believe, in the News-Sentinel, and lodged in the public consciousness.
We now have much better information (completed construction documents and a firm estimate from the contractor. Project cost is much higher than the preliminary (approximately $6,200,000 with developer contribution; $7,000,000 if the developer retains developer's fee) one to which people indexed their expectations, but it is also realistic.
I think there are people in the community who mistakenly believe that there was a recent "cost increase" from $6.2M to $7M. That's inaccurate. The former figure is the total project cost with the developer's fee being donated to the project; the latter fee is total project cost with the developer retaining his fee.
Thanks for the opportunity to clarify.
Sincerely,
Robert Finley
Mayors' Office of the Ten Year Plan to End Chronic Homelessness
400 Main Street
Knoxville TN 37902
rfinley@cityofknoxville.org
http://tenyearplan.org
865-215-3071
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