In a split vote Tuesday, the Sammamish City Council approved the use of contingency funds to cover Big Rock Park construction costs.

The council voted 4-3 to award $557,272 to Paul Brothers Inc., which brings Big Rock Park’s total project costs up to $784,633. That is about a 44 percent increase from the original budget.

The city will expend the 2015 park contingency fund, about $126,500, and will take the rest it needs from the year’s $5 million end-of-the-year balance. In all, the city will use these funds to cover an increase in budget of about $240,000.

“We’re dealing in a market where we have too many construction projects and not enough contractors to perform the work. Most of our bids are coming in high,” Sammamish Parks and Recreation Director Jessi Bon said Tuesday. “Frankly towards the end of the year, I think we’ve been a little surprised by market conditions. They really are favoring the contractors right now.”

After rejecting the only bid it received in July, which was about 70 percent higher than the city engineer’s original estimate for the work, the city opened the process up again in August.

This time it received three responses, all above the engineer’s estimate made about a year and a half ago during planning.

Paul Brothers’ total bid came in about $30,000 less than the next lowest bidder.

Going to bid again — whether in an attempt to get a lower overall cost or to remove something from the project’s scope to lower costs — would delay the project into the next year, Bon said.

Staff estimated construction to begin September and carry through December, taking about 90 days to complete. Delaying this would defer several other projects.

Bon and her staff are also not convinced the city could get a better deal.

“We do feel this is the number that’s representative of market conditions,” she said referring to the Paul Brother’s contact. “We do have the funds available to complete this work.”

The park, first donated to the city in 2011, had been pegged for a number of natural play structures, most notably a zip line.

Paul Brothers’ work will include installing an asphalt parking lot, ADA accessible trails, stone walls, a natural playscape, park structures, planting, irrigation, a new park entrance and overlook. It will use a less expensive trail surfacing, saving the city about $61,000. These savings are reflected in the final contract.

The contractor will not build the central boardwalk, which Bon said is an essential component of the park and accessible walkways. The portion of the work was advertised as a separate piece during the second round of bids. Ultimately, the parks department did not recommend paying a contractor for the work, in favor of using volunteers who have done this before.

She told the council it’s “within our skill set and capacity to do this work in house.”

Councilmembers Tom Odell, Nancy Whitten and Ramiro Valderrama-Aramayo opposed the motion to approve, with Mayor Tom Vance, Deputy Mayor Kathy Huckabay, Councilmembers Bob Keller and Don Gerend approving it.

The majority of concern from the opposing three related to completely emptying the parks contingency fund.

Bon tired to dispel this worry, saying this is the last parks project of the year. There will be funds in the upcoming year for contingencies.

There was also a layer of concern regarding the current financial climate in the nation and abroad and how that would affect the city and its project estimates. Specifically, Bon and council members used the Sammamish Landing project as an example of bids coming in higher than anticipated.

“I’m reluctant to go gung-ho on both these projects with this kind of an overrun,” Whitten said.

But the majority of the council was confident in its finances and the Big Rock Park project.

“We’re doing very well with the parks budget,” Gerend said. “I don’t think it’s time to say the sky is falling.”