Elected officials representing Westchester County have urged state and federal transportation officials to investigate the I-287 reconstruction project in the wake of a recent news report citing cost overruns and construction delays that have put the 11-year-old project some $67 million over budget.
The Journal News in a May 1 report on the massive $544-million project said it has cost more than $63 million per mile of construction, far more than the cost of comparable projects in New York. The work, awarded under five state contracts, is scheduled to be completed at the end of 2012. The reconstruction originally was expected to end by 2010.
The report prompted U.S. Sen. Charles E. Schumer to write to Federal Highway Administrator Victor Mendez to demand a “top-to-bottom investigation into what went wrong, what we can do to fix it, how we can prevent it from happening in other places and how we hold the proper individuals responsible.”
The Federal Highway Administration distributes federal funding to states for interstate highway projects and is also required to sign off on additional change-order requests that authorize the purchase of new materials or completion of additional work. Schumer said he was concerned that insufficient oversight on those requests led to the project failing to meet its projected budget.
State legislators in Albany called on state Transportation Commissioner Joan McDonald to investigate the project. In a separate request, Westchester”™s eight-member Assembly delegation pressed Gov. Andrew Cuomo to launch a probe.
The state transportation department said it will thoroughly review the project contracts, all of which were awarded to Yonkers Contracting Co. and Ecco III Enterprises in Yonkers.
Business Council welcomes new ”˜ambassadors”™
The Business Council of Westchester named community banker Michael Schiliro as chairman of its Business Council Ambassadors group in 2011.
Ambassadors are active Business Council members who mentor new members of the organization so they get maximum value from their membership and meet their business goals. The ambassadors”™ outreach continues for as long as members feel they need guidance.
The group is under the auspices of Anthony Justic, partner at Maier Markey & Justic L.L.P. in White Plains and vice chairperson of business development for the Business Council”™s executive committee.
Schiliro, who sits on the Business Council board of directors, is vice president and director of commercial lending and small business banking at Community Mutual Savings Bank in White Plains.
Also joining the Ambassadors group are Jill Singer, of Jill Singer Graphics in White Plains, and Kathleen D”™Agostino of Cablevision Rainbow Media.
Pace launches online degree program
Pace University this fall will launch iPace, (www.pace.edu/prospectivestudents/ipace) a largely online bachelor”™s degree program for students who work full-time or are otherwise too busy to pursue traditional campus studies.
Bachelor degree programs offered will include business studies from Pace”™s Lubin School of Business, with a choice of concentrations in business communications or internal auditing, and professional technology studies from the Seidenberg School of Computer Science and Information Systems, with a concentration in computer forensics. The programs are pending approval by the state Department of Education.
The iPace program includes web chats and other real-time online events as well as in-person meetings with Pace professors at the university”™s downtown New York City and White Plains campuses.
A Pace spokesman said 20 to 25 students will be enrolled in iPace for the fall semester for each degree program concentration. To qualify, applicants must have a grade point average of 2.5 or higher and 60 to 64 undergraduate credits or an associate”™s degree from an accredited community college, college or university. The part-time program is not open to international students.
Go Pace University!