The LSU College of Engineering’s $110 million expansion/renovation of Patrick F. Taylor Hall is running behind schedule after contract negotiations between the state and the project’s originally selected construction manager—a joint venture of global construction giant Skanska and locally owned MAPP Construction—fell through.
Officials with the Louisiana Division of Administration say they have terminated the contract with Skanska-MAPP, which was selected last year to oversee pre-construction work on the project.
Though there was no guarantee Skanska-MAPP would continue as construction manager during the project’s building phase, a deal to do so had been expected. However, in negotiating the contract over actual construction costs, Skanska-MAPP came back several million dollars over the $88 million budget for the project, state officials say.
“They were coming in around $93 million, and we don’t have the money to go that high,” says Mark Moses, director of facilities planning for the Division of Administration.
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