Video Shows Renovations, Possibilities of RA’s Lake House Property

Reston Association’s Lake House is now fully renovated and open for business.

RA is promoting the facility in a “Reston Today” YouTube video as a lakefront retreat available for meetings, corporate outings, weddings and other gatherings. Rates start at $100 an hour.

The Lake House has already been booked for a number of special events in upcoming months, and will be used for after-school care weekdays this fall, RA officials say.

But the Lake House, formerly known as the Tetra Building, is still the subject of an internal investigation. RA will hold a special Board of Directors meeting on Aug. 23 (6:30 p.m. at RA headquarters) to appoint an independent firm to conduct a review of the Tetra/Lake House Referendum and Budgets and receive information on and the first draft of RA’s 2017 Operating and Capital Budgets.

The RA Board passed a motion several months ago to convene a citizens group to hire an independent auditing firm to get to the bottom of a $430,000 cost overrun on Lake House renovations.

It is still unknown what the auditing firm’s costs will be.

RA purchased the Lake House for $2.65 million in July 2015. The 33-year-old building on the shores of Lake Newport, which served as the Reston Visitors Center for about 20 years, added to RA’s contiguous open space and fended off the chance of commercial development.

But as renovations got underway, costs soon began mounting. RA’s Board of Directors voted in late May to move $430,000 from its operating fund to cover the Lake House overrun.

RA CEO Cate Fulkerson has found several budget variances and cost-savings measures to cover the $430,000, Reston Now has previously reported.