With students attending classes in the newly constructed junior high wing at Panther Valley High School, district officials are ready to close out the project.

But school officials have differing opinions about who should pay for a construction manager who stayed on nearly three months after the project was "substantially completed" in June.Members of the board's budget and finance committee recently discussed the issue at length.The so-called "clerk of works" stayed on until late September.At the board's request, Richard "Skip" Laubenstine's job was to ensure that the project's contractors completed some unfinished items.Board member Michelle Markovich said she was under the impression that Laubenstine's pay would come out of the contractors' share, because he was there to oversee their work."I'm not confident telling people that $23,000 in overruns just goes under the rug," Markovich said.But board member John Williams said that it was the board's prerogative to hire Laubenstine to protect its interests. Williams said that Laubenstine was able to get the four contractors on the project to return and address those items, something that probably wouldn't have happened if he was let go."We chose to hire Skip. Almost 99 percent of this project was done properly. (His salary) is on us," he said.The issue came up after business manager Kenneth Marx asked if the board was comfortable releasing the last $300,000 owed to the contractors.After considerable discussion about who would pay Laubenstine's salary, Marx reminded the board that at a meeting earlier this year, they had already threatened the contractors to complete the work, or pay the salary."We said, if you don't get in here and complete these items, the district will withhold the money for the clerk of works," he said. "And they did most of what they needed to do."While he indicated he does not support charging the contractors for Laubenstine's pay, Marx still favors holding onto the $300,000 so that a few remaining construction items can be addressed on the $4 million-plus building."My top, most important thing is closing out the project," Marx said.