ST. CROIX — Nearly 12 years after ground was broken on the reconstruction of Paul E. Joseph Stadium, the project has another completion date: December 31, 2026. Government officials and contractor GEC LLC say the work can be finished by New Year’s Eve, but lawmakers who reviewed the project Friday were far less certain.
The stadium’s reconstruction officially broke ground in December 2014. Since then, the project has moved through repeated delays, redesigns, funding problems and revised completion schedules. As recently as April, lawmakers were told that the contractor’s latest schedule called for completion by September 30, 2026; before that, officials had spoken of delivering the stadium as a Christmas 2025 gift to the public.
The latest deadline emerged during Friday’s meeting of the Senate Committee on Culture, Youth, Aging, Sports and Parks, where government stakeholders and GEC appeared to provide another status update. The Legislature said the current completion date is Dec. 31 and that the project is approximately 75 percent complete.
According to Reuben Jennings, acting commissioner of the Department of Public Works, the current contracted value of the stadium construction is $32,124,000, with $27,710,507.02 in work completed to date. The Legislature’s summary of the hearing similarly placed the contract at approximately $32.1 million, with $27.7 million completed and paid and roughly $4.4 million remaining.
Mr. Jennings said the remaining scope includes ventilation, restroom and plumbing work, electrical installations on the field and upper concourse levels, the press box and audiovisual booth, stairways and railings, the outfield fence and camera platform, elevator work, storage areas, the umpire room, the backup generator building and other site improvements. The Legislature’s account likewise lists ventilation, plumbing, electrical work, elevators, stairways, railings, security systems, site improvements and the generator building among the major remaining components.
GEC Managing Member John Wessel maintained that the contractor can complete the project by the end of the year. He told lawmakers that materials needed to finish construction “have been ordered.” Three major items — the standby generator, service-entrance transformer and automatic transfer switch — will be ordered once a payment is processed by the Public Finance Authority.
Mr. Wessel’s confidence in the Dec. 31 deadline came with an important condition. “As long as the money flows, the way that Commissioner Jennings and Project Construction Manager Menzer have set it up to flow,” he said.
According to Mr. Wessel, an “accelerated pay estimate” procedure instituted by Public Works earlier this year has allowed materials to be purchased and installed more quickly. He said he would meet with newly appointed DPW Construction Project Manager Steve Menzer to finalize the project schedule and determine the manpower necessary to meet the year-end deadline. The Legislature said government agencies have also implemented direct vendor payments and additional financial controls in an effort to address contractor cash-flow problems.
Video Shows Extensive Work Still Outstanding
An 11-minute video recorded September 9 and presented by Public Works during Friday’s hearing did little to reassure senators. While the footage documented completed portions of the stadium, it also provided lawmakers with a detailed look at how much remains unfinished.
Among the visible outstanding work were concrete stairways that still have to be poured, downstairs bathrooms requiring dividers, and upstairs bathrooms that remain untiled and without toilets or faucets. An elevator has also not yet been installed.
Approximately 1,000 to 1,500 square feet of bathroom wall tile was stolen from the site, Mr. Wessel told lawmakers. GEC did not file a police report because, according to his testimony, the company lacks insurance coverage for theft.
The elevator has presented another complication. Mr. Wessel said there was an “error made in communication between Otis Elevator and GEC staff on site as to the height of the elevator,” and officials are now exploring a solution.
Elsewhere in the facility, walls remain unpainted and some ceilings are without lighting. The field has not yet been completed, the backup generator building remains to be constructed and the property has not been fully fenced. The nearby Terrance Martin field is overgrown and is expected to receive attention once major work on Paul E. Joseph Stadium is completed.
The Legislature separately reported that outstanding work includes final grading, interior finishes and construction of concrete stairways, while confirming that Public Works has increased project coordination from biweekly to weekly meetings and added a construction manager and field inspectors.
The amount of unfinished work left lawmakers openly questioning whether three months is sufficient.
“I'm usually a very optimistic individual, but after seeing that video, I have a little bit of trepidation,” Sen. Novelle Francis Jr. said.
Sen. Franklin Johnson said he initially believed the project could be accelerated by increasing manpower, but observed that the larger crews are not consistently present. “Even the workers are concerned that the project is not going to be completed. Even the workers are concerned about some of the flaws,” he said.
Sen. Angel Bolques Jr., who chairs the committee, expressed similar concerns. “It's just concerning to us, being that we've heard dates in the past, and with all of this work that's pending, it begs to differ,” he said, also questioning whether enough workers are available to meet the new schedule.
Mr. Wessel said 15 workers had been on site each day during the past week and another five were expected to arrive Monday. He maintained that the revised payment procedures have enabled GEC to increase staffing, but again tied his confidence in the deadline to continued funding. “The payments have to flow in order for me to have confidence,” he said.
Concerns About Rushing to Meet the Deadline
Sen. Alma Francis Heyliger acknowledged the project’s funding difficulties but cautioned against allowing the Dec. 31 deadline itself to create another problem. She said she was concerned that work could be rushed “and then our people are then shortchanged because the work is then rushed last minute just to meet this deadline.”
Mr. Menzer, however, said he believes the timetable is achievable. He told lawmakers that he has developed a schedule and identified the manpower required to complete the remaining work. “With my 40 years' experience, I feel [that] with the proper manpower, we can have that job done by [December 31],” he said.
Mr. Wessel told lawmakers that GEC maintains records for thousands of former workers who can be called upon when additional labor is required. Sen. Marvin Blyden questioned how many of those workers would actually be available, noting the volume of other construction and disaster-recovery work taking place across the territory.
The skepticism is rooted in a project history filled with missed targets. The original 2014 contract contemplated approximately two and a half years of construction, while later timelines included June 2018, early 2021, Christmas 2025 and, most recently, September 30, 2026.
Now the date is Dec. 31.
For Mr. Bolques, the question is whether this deadline will finally hold. “I don't want us to come back here next year and say Three Kings Day, or April Fools for that fact,” he warned.
