An Oakland school construction project is way over budget, more than a year behind schedule and being built in part by contractors under federal indictment in an unrelated bid-rigging scandal.

The rebuild of Glenview Elementary has been plagued by problems almost from the start, with delays and cost overruns angering neighbors, parents and city officials who question the competency of current and former Oakland Unified School District leaders.

The current price tag on the project is $54 million, although contractors just started the construction and costs could rise. Taxpayers were initially told it would cost about $40 million to build the new school on La Cresta Avenue in the Oakland hills.

“I honestly don’t think anyone at OUSD gave an ounce of thought toward thrift while this project was being planned and designed,” said Donna Rolle, who lives near the school. “This bothers some of us a lot — when we think of how our tax money is being squandered, and how much need there is in other, less affluent Oakland neighborhoods.”

The Glenview project is yet another headache for district officials, who are facing a separate fiscal crisis requiring them to make $15 million in cuts to classrooms and central office budgets this year and $11 million more next year.

Joe Dominguez, deputy chief of facilities, said the scope and design of the new school changed over time and that various costs within the construction industry pushed up the price tag. But instead of the district adjusting the project parameters to stay within budget, the cost to rebuild Glenview continued to climb unchecked, he said.

The district is now doing everything it can to reduce costs and get the school built as quickly as possible, said Dominguez, who came to the district last year.

“I am committed to making sure all of our facilities projects are on track,” he said. “We owe it to the students and families of OUSD to provide a safe and positive learning environment.”

Dominguez said the district has reviewed the building design and recently cut about $5 million from the project, including the elimination of pricey wood panels in the school’s foyer. Without the cuts, the school’s price tag would be close to $60 million, he said.

The Glenview project is being funded by a $475 million bond measure that city voters approved in 2012. The school required upgrades to address seismic concerns, but rather than renovate the existing structure, district officials decided to rebuild, arguing in 2014 that the cost difference was only about $5 million.

It’s unclear whether pending federal charges against the founders of Turner Group Construction, one of three general contractors teaming up to build the school, will cause further delays. A federal grand jury in April indicted Len Turner and Lance Turner on charges of conspiring to defraud the United States in connection with the renovation of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. The men have pleaded not guilty.

Dominguez said that if Turner Group Construction is ultimately removed from the Glenview rebuild because of the legal case, the other contractors will cover the work.

“This whole thing has been hard,” said Bob Alten, president and chief officer of Alten Construction, one of the other lead contractors. “But it really wouldn’t affect the schedule or the project in terms of a negative way.”

Still, there’s no way to make up all the lost time. Construction on the project was scheduled to start in July 2016 and end in June 2018. Students were supposed to move back into a brand-new school in the summer, but the building site remains a vacant dirt lot.

The project is taking longer than expected because district officials decided early to separate it into three phases, initiating the demolition phase before the Division of the State Architect approved the building design, something that can take several months even under the best of circumstances. At Glenview, that process dragged because the district decided to retain part of the old building’s Art Deco facade and incorporate it into the new building.

Despite facing the lengthy approval schedule, district leaders decided to knock down the old Glenview building once they had the demolition OK in fall 2016 and moved the 440 students to an unused school on the Emeryville border. The district is paying for buses to take students to and from school, a bill that is expected to reach $2 million before the new Glenview campus is ready.

“They made a very bad decision to move the kids out of Glenview a year before they had to,” said Andrea Dawson, chairwoman of the district’s bond oversight committee. “They didn’t tell the community the truth up front.”

The delays were exacerbated in January by a change in state law that increased competitive bidding requirements for school construction projects. The school board didn’t finalize the last Glenview contract until October.

The best-case scenario now is for students to return in January 2020, and even that will require costly overtime and Saturday construction shifts. Rainy weather and unforeseen circumstances could add delays — and costs.

“Nobody wanted this to play out in this prolonged way,” said Heather Imboden, a communications consultant being paid $234,000 out of the 2012 bond money to work with neighbors and others affected by the Glenview project.

District officials acknowledged the deviation from original plans, saying they are sympathetic to community complaints about noise, work hours and dust. But they say their focus is on getting the project done as quickly as possible.

“I am on the side of both the parents and the neighbors,” said school board member RoseAnn Torres, who represents the district where Glenview is located. “But we’ve got to build the school.”

Jill Tucker is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: jtucker@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @jilltucker