School kitchens cost millions
(CNS): According to Hunter Jones (left) of Tom Jones International (TJI), the general contractor building Cayman’s two new schools, many of what he termed the “Cadillac items” in the design are too late to change as the projects are so far advanced. However, he did say that his firm is working hard with the new government to help them shave some of the costs. Last week Rolston Anglin told the press that government is looking at a bill of $1.5 million for the school kitchens alone, which he said were five star restaurant grade fit-outs.
Anglin told the press at Friday’s media briefing that managing the situation surrounding the schools was literally a full time job for his ministry and that the priority was to get a team in place to deal with the litany of problems — one of which was the fact that the schools were rife with excesses.
“The PPM had promised us new schools but what they have given us is an operational mess,” he said. The new education minster explained that the lack of a project management team from the start had contributed further to the wider problems, from architects not being paid to sub-contractors walking off the job.
He said that a team and a reporting structure were being put together but the ministry was now seeking a manager to lead the project management team. He said a steering committee made up of people from the construction industry has also been established to work with TJI to reduce some of the costs, which he said were unnecessary and excessive.
“The kitchens cost more than most 5 star hotel kitchens at about $750,000 for each school,” he said. “We really need to get some semblance of sanity and some clarity on these projects,” the minister added.
Jones told CNS that there were a lot of custom designed items on the project that were part of the plans, which in many cases had already been made and paid for, and therefore it would not be possible to reduce a lot of the state-of-the-art facilities. “We are working with the government to change some of the Cadillac items to reduce costs, but the projects are so far advanced a lot of things just can’t be changed,” Jones said.
The question of overruns is also still outstanding as Jones has said that it could be as much as $17 million. However, the former education minster and the driving force behind the need to create state-of-the-art learning facilities, Alden McLaughlin, said that figure was absurdly high and that he believed the contractor was just trying to get more money than originally contracted. He told CNS last month that there could not possibly be any legitimate claims for such high overruns.
“I very much hope that the new government is not going to concede just because the developer makes a claim,” McLaughlin had said. “Up until I left office matters were still under discussion and no concessions had been made about the claims as webelieved that, by and large, they were not entirely genuine. We believed that the developer was taking advantage of the election to get more money, thinking government would give in to any demand.”
Category: Headline News
It is not the 60% "fronters" that are the problem, it is the 60% rule itself. The rule discourages the inflow of capital to Cayman and adds to the cost of living for ordinary Caymanians who do not have access to substantial capital by artificially adding to the profitability of domestic capital (which is passed on to consumers as inflated prices especially through oilgopolistic profits).
This entire problem and mentality also ties right back to our crime and gang problem. Our students are failing at school and there is no drive or push for them to do better because we have parents blaming everything on foreigners and spoiling our children by giving them everything in excess. So they end up being bored because everything is sooooo easy and thus falling by the wayside and getting involved in things that they have no business in. Come on people as a parent you mean to tell me you cannot notice that your son doesnt have a job but tends to be kitted out in the latest swagger…it is ridiculous.
We need to get rid of the mediocrity in our schools and stop making excuses! Spending millions of dollars on our kitchens and not the curriculum teachers books programmes etc is not the answer. As parents we need to spend extra time with our children , have them join the Public Library work with them in the evenings helping with their homwork and beyond. Put aside the DS and PS III and open a book with your child!!!!!
CNS: It would be interesting to see what the pass marks from the High School overthe past 12 years and a comparison against our peers within the region. I count a succesful pass rate as having 5 or more O’levels with grades A-C.
I would be extremely shocked if the pass mark for students graduating with 5 O’levels or more exceeded 20%!!!!!
To the person who can’t wait for Roy Bodden to take over UCCI…what is it you can’t wait for??? Where were you when Roy Bodden was the education minister?? What did he do then when he had the power to do all that he wanted and desired to do for eduction for our children?? He did nothing…. after ivan when the schools were destroyed he did nothing….. schools were teh last to be dealt with…GT Primary still waiting to be dealt with….
So what is it you are waiitng for……a miracle??…..I waiting too cause that what it ga take…a miracle.
why don’t they talk about the millions in duty that he waived for Ritz and Dart when they were buliding
Passionate teachers can not exist without the support from the parents. It is evident to anyone who has ever been to/ worked at a school, parents here protect their children from birth to death. Their child is NEVER wrong, even when caught red handed.
Until parent are parents, the children will never change and in fact it will get worse with every generation. So let’s see what we can do..
1. If you are over 25 and still living with your parents, GET OUT! It will make you grow up, it will help the economy and in the long run will make you a better person.
2. If you have your children living with your grandparents, you have ONE year to GET OUT. Get a new skill, live a little less luxurious and most of all start raising your own kids.
3. If you are driving a car with a car payment, are over 25 and living with Mom and/or Dad, then SELL YOUR CAR, you can’t afford it, and then next weekend get out the house and buy a less expensive car and use any money left over for your first months rent.
4. If you have children/young adults who are failing in school, then you must spend at least an hour a day helping them. If you can’t help them (the reading and writing are too hard), then find someone who can help them. I know numerous teachers who would help out for FREE if you just ask them.
5. If you child gets caught doing something, then punish them. Don’t go to the school and blame an expat teacher, the school system, or anyone else for your problems. That is right, the child is YOUR problem, deal with it, stop protecing it. No child has ever grown and matured if they are cuddled everyday.
That is it for today’s lesson, but take note, this is the PARENTS fault.
Passionate teachers! What a mouthful, I couldnt have said it any better, when parents stop blaming teachers, any teacher whether it be expat or not and take responsibility for THEIR own actions and the actions of their unruly children then the teachers can do their jobs of teaching and making a difference. If you all cared you would stop the blame game and see that your child goes to school obey the rules and have respect for the staff and their fellow peers, maybe then we will see a difference and start to make this country a better place to live. I am much afraid that what we are seeing now in Cayman our forefathers would roll over in their graves. Having million dollar kitchens have nothing to do with common sense or education, lets concentrate on the influence that we the parents have over our children and start doing something about our attitudes.
We can throw blame around until the cows come home, but it will not change the reality we live with — most children in today’s world operate within a deficit as far as home life is concerned. Sad but true.
Schools simply have to rise to the challenge. That is reality.
And schools need to begin to think out of the box in terms of strengthening the school experience.
Hey maybe we go use some of the little money left over that was going to be used on paying for teachers, and get some top notch 18inch rims for the school buses.
After all the children deserve the best!
Can’t wait in a few years time for school leavers to get interviewed for jobs (satire warning)
interviewer: "so Mychael, what can you bring to our company?"
school leaver " well the school couldn”t afford good teachers, but I’ve got experience of eating from a 5 star kitchen! does that get my foot in the door, pretty please?"
It completely boggles the mind that they are so many people in favour of spending $1.5M on TWO kitchens for two HIGH schools. Can you people not understand:
1) We simply cannot afford such extravangances
2) We do not have a high level culinary arts programme offered in any of the schools
3) The number of Caymanian chefs or those who aspire to be chefs are insignificant to warrant such an expenditure
4) There is no real tangible benefits ie we will not be making any revenue from these fantabulous school kitchens orreaping any intangible benefits – refer to 3 above.
5) It was a complete waste and over-spending of money; Even if I turn a blind eye and justify one kitchen why in heavens name did we need TWO???
6) The cooking classes offered back when I went to high school was the regular pizza, pastry simple dishes etc and the simple kitchen we had was more than adequate to suit those needs.
7) Showing off to say that we have the most expensive kitchen in the Caribbean is not worth the breath it takes to say this. We should be striving to brag about the highest passes, highest literacy rates etc
We always tend to focus on the wrong things and never tackle the real problems. We are passing children through our school system who CANNOT read!!!! Yet we are justifying spending $1.5 million dollars on a kitchen.
GET REAL people!!! Enough of the blind party politics loyalty.
What amazes me is that we can spend over $100K on the kitchen for the Governor’s residence to feed a few, but not $1.5M on a kithcen that is meant to feed 1000. Not to mention these buldings were desigend as a hurricance shelters to last a long time. Most of the posters on this article have no idea of the cost of commercial kitchen equipment or material cost. Yet I bet many of them complain tht they do not own a residene. Do the ever wonder why?
What amazes me is that in the midst of a global financial crisis the PPM:
was spending $1.5million to build a kitchen, while 1,500+ caymanians remained unemployed.
was spending emergency money (usually used for natural disasters) to build a lover’s wall in East end.
The PPM has destroyed the finances of the Cayman Islands.
"while 1,500+ caymanians remained unemployed"
Where did you get this figure from? Your imagination?
"was spending emergency money (usually used for natural disasters) to build a lover’s wall in East end".
You are obviously an idiot. The wall was built as a seawall in one of the worst-hit areas by Hurricane Ivan. The roads were completely destroyed in that area. It is only a called ‘lovers wall’ to add an attractive feel to it.
One of hte concerns I have overall is the emphasis on buildings rather than the activities that go on in those buildings.
I jsut saw a segment in CNN’s Black in America series — avout a small school that sends every child on to college. How does it do it? Not by selection of students, not by some new fangled idea (Angela Martins can take note), but by extending the teaching experience (the school days are longer and school is held on Saturday.) And a few other teaching-focused strategies.
The principal also believes passionately in the students’ success, and maintains a very high profile among students — even to the point of picking up students himself — he drives a bus!
When are we going to realise that the building does not cut it — yes, you need resources — but first of all you need passionate teachers.
And one of the ways towards achieving that is leadership and, yes, valuing teachers.
One of the ways of valuing teachers is to pay them more. it is disgraceful how little we pay teachers.
Check out what countries like Canada does — my grand neice is finishing up university preparation for a teaching career — and I am told that her beginning salary will be $100,000 per year, not to mention the benefits.
Come on — it is not good enough to say that money should not be an issue — it is an issue for everybody, why not teachers?
What a good salary allows for is for those who are passionate about teaching (my neice is) to feel that they can enjoy a reasonable standard of living while pursuing their passion.
McKeeva — do something for education — put the value on teachers — and you will see more Caymanians gravitating to teaching.
I am looking forward to Roy Bodden’s joining UCCI as president. This man is passionate about teaching and that is what we need — passionate leadership.
Roy, we can’t wait!
TO THE FOLLOWING POSTER – Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Thu, 07/23/2009 – 13:14. – The is NO NEED for your swear words! You can carry on a conversation without cussing! CNS – you should not print stuff with swear words in it….even if it’s just the first letter of the swear word. You are potentially setting yourself up to be shut down even quicker….as you know the powers that be are so hungry to throw their weight around that allowing those kinds of postings will only give them more fuel for their fire!
If people can’t post without making mention to the "F" word or any other swear words for that matter, their comments shouldn’t be posted. Yes, we all want freedom of speech…but there’s no need to insult our ears and eyes with swear words! Speak without swearing PLEASE…..makes you sound alot more intelligent!
Yes its no secret we seem to have indulged alot of their "passions" unfortunately for the Caymanian people who could not afford then and surely cant afford it now. We will have passions and a beautiful kitchen and cannot afford to buy food to put in it. Do you see them driving around in their fabulous luxury SUV’s i guess that must be another passion. The only passion that appears to missing is looking out for the welfare of Cayman and its residents by not putting us in serious debt. In regards to ungrateful ask them about that another passion i guess?
WTF??? How many Kitchens are we talking about here? For 1.5MM, Is it equiped with fully functional robotic staff? Or does it have a vending machine that you can order Oxtail, Curry Goat and all the other local dishes at the press of a button? C’mon man….
As far as I know the costs of these projects should be made available from the beginning, any general contractor needs to know the cost limits in order to finalize the contract in good terms. Was it really necessary to build five star restaurant kitchens for children? Danny, Arlington Heights remodeling
I have to say that the kitchen cost is actually very good. I have worked in the restaurant/hotel industry all my life, I know first hand that commercial kitchens are not cheap. This is just a dramatic headline to stir the pot! I oversaw a restaurant kitchen remodel that was US$800,000.00 Please note that was a remodel not brand new! For the number of students these kitchens will feed on a daily basis, the cost is actually good. Commercial kitchens tend to use very heavy duty equipment that can last 20 years if cleaned daily. We could also use the schools as shelters and be able to feed people in the event of a storm. I do find it totally irresposible on the government’s part, to not have a project manager. There are so many government employees that need something to do! If you had the head of planning running the project, they would learn why so many developers have tabled projects of the last few years.
Why anyone would think that getting the very best for our children is a terrible deed is beyond me! And just because schools do no produce profits we should not want to spend top dollar on our educational facilities?! Well, look at the millions spent on the Boatswain Beach which was ‘supposed’ to produce huge profits…..that is what we should be screaming about – it is a disgrace and costing us millions annually! Talk about ‘being completely extravagant and ostentatious with Government funding’. We are in the mess we are in today because past administrations (like the current ones) have not thought it necessary to spend on our children’s education…our children have too long been given zero attention – many of them are graduating with bare minimum academic capabilities!! So please!!…we are not in financial crisis because the schools are costing us millions….try to understand that the entire world is in financial crisis! And the other thing we should never stop screaming about is the massive status grants which will ride our backs for every Caymanian generation to come…..this financial crisis will pass and thankfully we will have first class educational facilities/curriculum for our children, however, the status grants is not something that will ever pass…our children will carry that burden with them forever!
Everyone seems to agree that the government has gone to the extreme to design these "State-of-the Art" schools that leave the country broke. Although new schools are desperately needed…are the students going to suffer because there’s no money left over to improve the curriculum and raise the education standards?
If you’ve been following the articles in the Observer, it is apparant that our youth are in need of supportive mentoring and improved services. However, it seems that the Ministry of Education is not ready to jump on the bandwagon. Cayman Sports Auhtority was recently highlighted in the Observer on its intention to develop a school fitness program, at very little cost to the government, to increase the level of fitness and health for the students. Students are not receiving what government is supposed to provide (each student is not getting their one hour of fitness per week and not all students even participate). The program is designed to not only improve children’s fitness levels, but increase self-esteem, keep them focused, understand team dynamics, etc. The program will be funded through private funding. The schools only keep their facilities and busses available to the students and trainers
Although there is a lot of enthusiasm from parents and teachers for the program, the Ministry does not appear to see outside their office walls. Again…not acting in a proactive manner.
It’s time to build the people, not shiny buildings.
Well it seems as if we have completly adopted the "second class citizen" mentality where we feel that our Caymanian children are not entitled to the best! Please try to focus on the following:
These schools were not built for short term; there were built with a long term vision that would ensure they would be in optimum condition for as long as possible. New top of the line equipment would require less or no maintenance for years to come!
Our children are in a market where they have to compete with the best from all over the world! How can they be expected to learn and gain experience on the basic equipment and then step into the Ritz to work in a kitchen where i’m sure the top of the line exist! But maybe we have convinced ourselves that our kids not good enough to work at establishments like the Ritz!
Revenue shortfalls are ebing experienced worldwide at more significant levels than any of us could have predicted! Why dont we focus on helping the Government find creative ways to cut back expenditures instead of these knee jerk exaggerated political and miguided statements.
I’m sure ttthat the former Minister fo Education and PPM Government will be happy to provide the rational for the decisions made with regards to equipping the schools. I for one, am proud that they believed in our children and wanted only the best for them.
CAN WE GET A COST ON HOW MUCH THE NEW ADMINISTRATION BUILDING KICHEN COST??
Thank you!!!! – Wed, 07/22/2009 – 22:14.
The level of stupidness of some of the posters on this site completely baffles me. Listen people the election is OVER, we have a new government. I am pissed that not one of my independents are not in but guess what – I had to get over it. It seems as if both sides of this PPM/UDP nonesense in a roundabout way are "happy" to rejoice in the crap that these politicians are dishing out. Hello WE the Caymanians are going to suffer either way. So instead of focussing on who is doing what lets try to mature and focus on the issues and hold them accountable for their actions.
This is a disgrace and our children are going to lose out in the long run because how in heavens name do you think we are going to be able to maintain a 750k kitchen et al?? It is going to end up being through cuts of the most important matters- text books, teachers, training, etc etc etc
We need to think of creative ways to help this current Education minister get out of this very deep hole that the previous ego maniac put the COUNTRY in. This is a very difficult situation which is not going away anytime soon.
FOCUS PEOPLE FOCUS!!!!!!
Lets check Kurt and Alden for this money since they fix this contract up along with his top advisor who could pay also Any thing to do with food aaaaaah gluttony is a deadly sin Why should Cayman pay for this?
$1.5 million seems extravagant.
CNS: i don’t think it qualifies as "millions" though.
Some of the 1.50Mio was maybe set aside for the "60 % Caymanian fronter" to get his new Ferarri and to keep out of the day to day business involvement and may press to hire Caymanians. But what the heck do they care as long as they are getting fat and having fun without any formal investigations they keep on fronting and having fun at our expense!!! We need to start to expose those Individuals not the foreign Companies, without those 60% Partners (our own Caymanians, we know who they are) we would not have or would not need many of those Jones setting up shop here!
Regardless of the political party involved there seems to be a common thread when government builds something and that is it is extremely expensive and they seem to want the most and best regardless of need.
This includes Pedro’s castle, Botswain Beach and the current school construction and unfortunately other projects I do not know about.
NO Project Manager ?????????????
Well, that answers everything….. A project of this sze, and no one from government to manage it or protect our interests is utter maddness. Sure looks like the someone let the fox into the henhouse……………..
It is no secret that the former Minister of Education had a passion for education and wanted only the best for our Caymanian children.
It is also no secret that the former LOGB has a passion for food and would spare nothing in making certain that it is prepared with and by the best.
Therefore it is pure ungratefulness to think that providing the best for our children is too good or costly.
Shame on all who complain and try to point the facts in the wrong direction.
PPM disgust me!
Why would people waste money on buildings, but deny teachers a raise?
I believe PPM needs to tell the truth about where the $74M dollars was spent, or transferred to.
The Fox is driving a Ferrari………..!!!
The lesson here is that we NEED to have Boards that oversee these sort of projects from the inception. Trying to close the gate after the horse has bolted is a futile task.
The ‘road to hell is paved with good intentions’. While I have no doubt in the genuine desire of the people in Govt. (ALL of them) to deliver the best for this country, without ‘realists’ to bring balance to the equation, these sort of ‘Excesses’ will only grow in the future.
A clearly defined set of Goals for this project would have reigned-in this sort of thinking before it had time to develop to this. Should a school have adeqate canteen facilities? YES. Should They have Teak panelling and ‘floating ceilings’? NO.
The question I would like answered is, what of the Cost to equip and staff these schools for the student to LEARN? What of maitenance costs?
Successful business is built on looking at the whole picture, Short, Medium, and Long term. Whether we like to admit it or not, Govt. IS a business. You can only spend what you can earn to repay …… or else you go BANKRUPT !
Clearly, someone was asleep at the wheel.
The old sour PPM cronies will never give it up! There is a huge difference with legitimate project overruns and being completely extravagant and ostentatious with Government funding. The schools only required basic kitchen needs and not million dollar top of the line facilities! Has anyone ever seen a school produce revenue! This would never be justified by paying for itself! Alden and Angela were extremely wasteful with precious limited funds and were instrumental in driving this country into the crisis we are facing!
Ahh so the PPM was justified in wasting the pubics money "as the UDP" did it first, great argument.
Unfortunatelty the only losers in this case are Caymanians.
So I guess the UDP can now use theat arguement again then, for the next 4 years
How old are you for such childishness?
If anyone should go to jail for maladministration and misuse of government funds the original UDP team would be serving some serious years in prison for the maladminsitration and misuse of funds for the Botswain Beach mess, the housing mess and lets not talk about the port mess.. so before stones are thrown at PPM people need to remmeber what happened with the UDP amdinistration before and dont think that you ga getting anything better this time around if anything it will be way time worse.
Thie PPM should be charged with maladministration and thrown in jail for misuse of Government funds. They are a shame and a disgrace, building these nancy story structures to feed their own egos.